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THROUGH THE YEAR. 



Through the Year. 



THOUGHTS 

RELATING TO THE SEASONS OF NATURE 

AND THE CHURCH. 



BY / 



HORATIO N. POWERS, 

RECTOR OF ST. JOHN's CHURCH, CHICAGO. 



oX«o 



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7 "^5-V\ 
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BOSTON: 
ROBERTS BROTHERS. 

1875- 






Copyright, 1875, 
By Roberts Brothers. 




Cambridge: 
Press of John Wilson ^ Son, 



TO 

ALL WHO BELIEVE IN AN INVISIBLE KINGDOM 

AND 

ASPIRE AFTER THE BETTER LIFE, 

I INSCRIBE THIS VOLUME. 

. H. N. P. 



C O N T E xN T S. 



JFtom atit)£nt t0 3Lznt 

Page 

I. A Joyous Religion 3 

II. The Bread of Life 15 

in. Preparation for a Happy Christmas . . 29 

IV. The Babe lying in a Manger ..... 41 

V. The Childhood of Jesus 53 

Eenten Bags. 

VI. The Burden of the Desert 69 

VII. Love in Death 81 

VIII. Loneliness. 91 

IX. Dying with Christ 103 

lEastet anti lEaster^STitie* 

X. The Sepulchre in the Garden .... 113 

XI. The Spiritual Body 123 

XII. Palingenesis 137 

XIII. The Time of the Singing of Birds. . . 147 



vm CONTENTS. 



Page 

XIV. Wings 159 

XV. Soul-Light 165 

XVI. Words 171 

after 5rtmitg^ 

XVII. The Temporal and the Eternal . . . 185 
XVIII. Christ's Reverence for the Human 

Soul ' .... 197 

XIX. The Miracle of Dreams 207 

XX. The Constancy of the Divine Order 

IN Nature 221 

XXI. An Autumn Walk 235 

Nature, J^umanitg, Belicjfon. 

XXII. Agassiz 249 

XXIII. SUMxNER 263 

XXIV. KiNGSLEY 276 



FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 



^^ Let the righteous he glad,^^ 

Psalms Ixviii. 3. 

" That your joy might he fulL^^ 
^ John xv. ii. 



A JOYOUS RELIGION. 

nPHE explanation of the existence of any religion is 
found in the nature of man. Animals can have 
no religion, because they have no capacity for it. 
Man has such a capacity, but a capacity that varies 
according to his spiritual and intellectual advancement. 
He loves ; he aspires ; he looks out on a world of 
mystery ; he wants happiness ; death is before him. 
He is conscious of his limitations and infirmities, 
and the need of superhuman assistance. So a religion 
cf some kind is inevitable. The best religion will 
be one that supplies his highest want, that puts his 
whole nature to its right and intended use. Pure Chris- 
tianity does this. But there are perversions of Chris- 
tianity. Let there be misconceptions of the divine 
character, and hence of the government of the universe 
and the object of our existence, and religion w^ill show 
the error. 

Now I assume that true religion ought to be promotive 
of human happiness. "Let the righteous be glad," 
says the Psalmist. And our Lord among His tenderest 
words said to His disciples, " These things have I 
spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and 
that your joy might be full." But joyfulness cannot be 



FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 



secured by the suppression or disuse or perversion of 
the natural faculties. True religion gives harmonious 
play to these, and sanctifies their uses. It is one of the 
features of man's dignity in the scale of being, that he 
has a rational soul. The faculty of reason was bestowed 
for high and noble ends. It is to be used on all sub- 
jects that can concern our human interests. To depre- 
ciate its employment and its power is to depreciate its 
great achievements, — the monuments of mechanical in- 
vention, the discoveries of science, the choicest fruits 
of industry and learning, all the splendid utilities that 
take us out of barbarism and make history illustrious. 
The faculty of reason is to be employed as well in 
religion as anywhere else. To say that it is right in 
God to do what is wrong in man ; that it is good in God 
to be what is evil in man, — is an affront to the sense 
with which God has endowed us, and a debasement of it. 
When God is represented as inconsistent, unjust, cruel, 
and vindictive, it is just as proper to resent it and deny 
it as to deny that two and two are ten, or that a circle 
is a square. It is a poor compliment to the Almighty 
to use the logical faculty in affairs of daily business, — 
in planting and reaping, in buying and building, — and 
to repudiate it when we come to think and act with 
reference to Him and His blessed word. There are 
matters, of course, above reason in all the concerns of 
life ; so, too, in an infinite measure, in the nature and 
ways of God ; but to acknowledge this fact, and act in 
accordance with it, does not disparage reason or pour 
contempt upon it. God does not require iis to accept 



A JOYOUS RELIGION. 5 

what we have no faculty to receive, or to do what, by 
virtue of our very nature, we are absolutely incapable 
of performing. We are to employ the logical faculty in 
its legitimate way in every direction that invites useful 
investigation, and, if the heart is the abode of love, life 
shall grow richer for these exercises. Used in their 
proper sphere, every faculty of man becomes an instru- 
ment of his happiness, and hence illustrative of the 
divine glory. Take the desire of knowledge, for in- 
stance. We are in the midst of innumerable wonders, 
with our human necessities pressing us. There is a 
curiosity to find out the uses of things, to trace results 
to causes, to uncover the obscurities of history and the 
plan of creation, to get the equipments for success in 
the struggle of life. Moreover, there is a pleasure in the 
very act of learning, in mastering difficulties, in acquir- 
ing knowledge, that subserves human comfort and pros- 
perity, and at the same time reveals the infinite wisdom. 
It is our duty to use this noble faculty of intelligence in 
every direction where it can be advantageously employed, 
and the doctrine that it must be restrained lest some 
notion once held to be sacred — some error of doctrine 
or practice — should be overthrown, is pernicious. I 
have known persons myself who stood in fear of learn- 
ing, and discouraged it on the ground that it was hostile 
to religion. It only kills the errors and superstitions 
that ignorance engenders. He who decries actual sci- 
entific knowledge virtually decries the wisdom of God 
in giving man his vast powers, and in building the 
universe as He has. 



FROM ADVENT TO LENT 



Then, as to the aesthetic tastes, the love of the beau- 
tiful, the same principle is true. Man is endowed with 
a feeling for order, symmetry, adaptation, harmony, 
beauty in its manifold forms. Who endowed him? 
God. And why did God make the material world so 
glorious, if it were not to be admired and enjoyed ? 
What purpose serves the loveliness of flower and star, 
and radiant landscape, and glowing firmament, the light 
and music and splendor and wonder of the earth, if no 
eyes behold the miracle and no heart enjoys it? If you 
say God enjoys it, then truly it is right that His children 
appreciate what He loves, and has made so fair. One 
is allowing one side of his nature, and hence one source 
of enjoyment, to be inoperative by suppressing this 
faculty of taste. Yet such views of religion are taught 
as make all regard for the beautiful simply frivolous and 
sinful, as if God was displeased with the pleasure of 
His children in the marvels of art and the glories of His 
handiwork. But to reject the loveliness that fills the 
universe is to slight the Divine Goodness. True religion 
enjoys all that reveals the harmony and beauty that are 
perfect in Him who is in all and over all. 

Then, too, as to the natural affections. God is hon- 
ored by their legitimate exercise. He implanted them. 
They are the symbols of His love. To think that He 
begrudges His children the joy of earthly friendships, — 
the felicities of home and society, — is insulting to His 
gracious fatherhood. He smiles on the gladness of 
every heart, on the endearments of the household, the 
delight of the lover, the parent's tenderness, the spon- 



A JOYOUS RELIGION, 



taneous gayety of the child. If there is any thing on 
earth that is rooted deeply in the nature that God Him- 
self implanted, it is this sacred feeling for kindred, and 
home, and friends, and country, and the great brother- 
hood of man. But the blessed gospel has been so 
misinterpreted as to lead men to think that they did 
God service by crucifying these natural affections, by 
trying to extirpate them. The wilderness and monastery 
bear awful witness to the monstrous follies that have 
followed the practice of a gloomy and insane asceticism, 
the effort to please God by the disuse or perversion of 
what He has given for human good. True religion 
gives play to all the natural sensibilities and affections 
of the heart. It consecrates them to their legitimate 
service, but does not repress or extirpate. God would 
have every pure emotion, every gift for friendship, every 
capability for admiration and honor and reverence, 
employed in the relations of society and the household 
and the State. Christ came not to destroy, but to save ; 
and there is no greater perversion of His gospel than 
the view that God is pleased at the unnatural mortifica- 
tions of human affections, and that the happiness of His 
children is not welcome in His sight. 

All such mistakes grow out of wrong views of our 
Father in heaven. So a religion will not be a joyous 
one with dark and forbidding views of God. Picture 
God .as an arbitrary sovereign, doing what is unjust 
and requiring what is unreasonable, and the sweetness 
and hope and joy are all taken out of religion. So 
where He is taught as frowning upon the innocent 



FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 



pleasures of mankind ; where He is represented as fore- 
ordaining vast numbers of immortal beings to everlasting 
misery, delivering to future woe the generations who 
have been destitute of His light; where He is described 
as making Himself glorious in the agonies of the damned, 
and executing an arbitrary choice in selecting the candi- 
dates for heaven, — then the human mind instinctively 
and inevitably revolts. Such a being cannot be obeyed, 
except through the fear of torment ; cannot be enjoyed, 
save through some strange religious hallucination. He 
has been described, even in Christian times, by some 
who thought they understood His word, in a way that 
makes Him appear to candid, sincere, and affectionate 
souls as an infinite tyrant. Adhere rigorously to the 
absolute truth of such doctrines as I have indicated, 
and human life is shrouded in gloom. The brightness 
of the material world becomes a hideous mockery. 
There is no motive for noble enterprise, no inspiration 
to gracious charities. The sweetness dies out of exist- 
ence. The blossoms of the heart wither away. 

Now, we can never fathom the fulness of God, or 
formulate all His truth. But, beholding His glory in 
the face of Jesus Christ, we can get such just concep- 
tions of His character and will as shall make our service 
a blessing and a joy. We know, indeed, that His will 
is everlasting good will ; that His justice is not another 
kind of justice from that which we can understand ; that 
His love is not another kind of love from that which 
He^ puts into our hearts ; that His wisdom is not an- 
other kind of wisdom from that which is displayed in 



A JOYOUS RELIGION, 9 

His wonderful works, that day unto day uttereth speech 
of Him^ There are not two kinds of goodness, one for 
God and another for man. There are not two kinds of 
justice, one for God and another for man. There are 
not two kinds of righteousness, one for God and another 
for man. In goodness and justice and righteousness 
the quality is the same in both God and man, — the 
difference is in the quantity and relations. In God the 
good is absolute and measureless ; in man it is limited, 
and affected by his infirmities and imperfections. God 
is the fountain of all goodness, as the sun is the foun- 
tain of every ray of light that reaches the earth. So 
we know that while we reject what is unjust, what is 
impure, what is untrue, while we love and pursue what 
is holy and good, we are doing His will. We see that 
in the way of holiness is the way of salvation. And 
here, for our rescue and guidance and comfort and 
refuge, is the divine disclosure of the Son of God. 
His joy was perfect, because He was a perfect Son ; and 
as, through the cleansing spirit, we become like Him, 
we have a portion of His joy. Oh ! beholding Him, in 
our low estate, full of grace and truth, illustrating every 
virtue, pouring out His sympathies to souls hungry and 
thirsty for God ; teaching, consoling, giving life and the 
light of love ; making gladness in dreary homes, filling 
the lowly and desponding with blessed hope and the 
strong confidence of the infinite care ; showing the grand 
significance of life and the opulent treasures of immor- 
tality ; suffering, dying for us, " the just for the unjust ; " 
vanquishing sin and death, and filling eternity with the 



lO FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

glow of His victorious life, — beholding this friend, 
brother, Saviour, Christ the Lord, ^' the brightness of 
the Father's glory," — shall we think the God of all a 
hard master or a cruel judge, or the existence He gives 
us less than a precious boon ? Ah ! we know from all 
this gracious manifestation that life means good ; that 
in our Lord there is fulness of joy, and at His right 
hand pleasures for evermore. The whole Gospel is 
good news, bringing cheer and hope and inspiration 
to all who have ears to hear. What Christ discloses 
as the will of God concerning us is in harmony with 
the constitution of things, — our human nature, condi- 
tion, and needs. Our happiness will be insured by 
taking His methods and living His life, which is be- 
gotten in obedience and faith. God does not force 
upon us a religion inconsistent with His perfections, 
or with the nature He has given us and the place we 
are to fulfil in His creation. Christianity practically 
is the use of life in accordance with the divine nature 
and goodness, and its fruition is blessedness here and 
hereafter. 

I know what is said about this view by those who 
hold to the hard, mechanical, soulless, arbitrary system 
of a despotic divine sovereignty, and who make Chris- 
tianity an afterthought, an invention in the mind of the 
Almighty to remedy what He previously failed to ac- 
complish. They stigmatize this religion as a religion 
of sentiment, — one that is quite inadequate for the 
great needs of a sinful race. But take out of the Chris- 
tian religion those elements which they profess to treat 



A JOYOUS RELIGION. II 

with such lightness, if not contempt, and what remains ? 
Throw out the element of common sense ; throw out 
all sensibility to the beautiful, and especially to beauty 
of a spiritual kind ; throw out the experiences of the 
soul in the sight of the mysteries of life and death, and 
good and evil, and the presence of the infinite all around 
us j throw out the exercise of the affectionate nature, 
all that moves to trust and devotion and charity, and 
the clinging eagerness of prayer; throw out the love 
of holiness for its own sake, and the sympathies that 
reach and clasp the infinitely good and strong in the 
consciousness of a deathless friendship ; throw out all 
that has the color and fragrance and charm of the 
heart about it, — and what is left for life but a dry chan- 
nel, a flowerless waste, the arid sands ? Such a relig- 
ion would be good for nothing ; nay, religion itself would 
expire, for the very basis of it, and elements of it, would 
be overthrown. Those who sneer so much at a relig- 
ion that accords with our human want ; that is grounded 
in the very constitution and necessities of life ; that makes 
provision for the mind, the heart, the imagination, the 
whole man, — will find, when they come to comprehend 
the situation, that the sneer is against God Himself. 

We are placed here for a benevolent purpose ; and 
that theology which makes the world darker than it is ; 
which depresses the candid, truth-seeking mind, instead 
of cheering and encouraging it ; that destroys the in- 
centives to hopeful labor and the inspirations of love 
and duty, and that confuses the ideas of justice and 
righteousness in sincere souls, — is not a good theology. 



12 FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 

What is not useful in religion as well as in other spheres 
of human concern must ultimately be discarded. The 
power and glory of the blessed gospel is in the fact 
that it promotes the highest possible utilities. Its ful- 
ness is inexhaustible. The loving and obedient disciple 
knows where he gets his best hope, his richest resources, 
the light in which he sees light beyond the grave. He 
knows that it is not in some formulary that a theologian 
has constructed about the absolute God, but in the love 
of Christ which constrained him to repentance ; and, 
looking through the medium of that love, he is content 
to trust his Heavenly Father, to take the Master's hand 
and to live His life, about which there is no mistake. 

So the great cause of joyfulness in religion is in our 
right relations with God. If sin does not burden, if the 
conscience does not accuse, if there is a consciousness 
of the nearness of God in Christ, a confidence of love 
that leads to holy and dutiful living, the result must be 
very gracious. I know how far the best are from real- 
izing their ideal; how, amid temptations and trials, 
there is stumbling and halting in the blessed way. I 
know, too, how, with all our blessings, it seems dark 
to us sometimes, and that sorrow seems to spring up 
rather than joy. But yet this is not the prevailing 
experience. We cannot wonder that it is so when we 
remember that our Lord Himself had His dark and bit- 
ter hours ; and what was good for Him is good for us. 
And, still, joy does dwell where His love abides, though 
there be seasons of pain and affliction. It is this sun- 
shine on the heart that gives the best cheer, the great- 



A JOYOUS RELIGION. 1 3 

est consolation that we have. Where the spiritual life 
is vital, even sad experiences have blessed interpreta- 
tion, and we see life, and its relationships and duties, 
through a medium that makes them sacred and beauti- 
ful. To look out on the world where God is ever work- 
ing, and to feel that He who spins the starry systems 
along their glittering courses cares for us ; to see His 
love in the true and loving hearts around us ; to behold, 
in flower and bird and every beauteous thing, a ray of 
His transcendent loveliness ; to feel that all things — 
our lives, the generations, the great movement of the 
universe — are going on in the order of His will ; that 
love is the law of all, — this is an inspiring view, shed- 
ding gladness into the heart. And as we grow weary 
in our journey, little by little, and friends fall around 
us, and the grave is near, there is a sweet joy in 
being able to look beyond time, — seeing all through 
the dark valley the pathway of the Lord, who goes 
before us, and knowing that because He lives we shall 
live also. This religion of Christ is a religion of hope 
and consolation and joy, because it meets our human 
wants, and enables us to fulfil the ends of our creation. 
God requires of us only what is reasonable ; but in the 
love and following of the Master is the exemplification 
of the sweetest reasonableness, -7- the wisdom which 
is holy and heavenly, whose treasures are imperishable. 
Let us follow the divine methods, and make our lives 
harmonious with the gracious will and nature of God. 



" But he answe7^ed a7id said^ It is writte7t^ Man shall not 
live by bread alone^ but by every word that proceedeth 
out of the 7nouth of Gody — Matthew iv. 4. 



II. 



THE BREAD OF LIFE. 

A S man has a twofold nature, — the animal and the 
spiritual, — so his tendencies have two directions. 
The flesh and the spirit are always contending, in his 
experience, for the mastery. By yielding to the one 
come his nobleness and glory ; to the other, his degra- 
dation and shame. The gospel does not disparage any 
thing that contributes to his physical good. It is one of 
the glories of Christianity that it has vastly improved the 
material condition of the race. To feed the hungry, and 
clothe the naked, and nurse the sick, and to be diligent 
in business, are among its prime obligations. Before 
man can rise to the higher levels of mental and spiritual 
culture, he must have put himself, to some extent, beyond 
the slavery of animal want. The missionary who goes 
with the word of life among the neglected and wretchedly 
destitute class in our cities, finds that he can accomplish 
little for their souls until he has relieved the present im- 
portunate distress of the body. Christ contemplated the 
whole man in Plis all-embracing regard, and so no inter- 
est that pertains to our humanity is ignored or under- 
rated in the scope and sense of His revelations. 

But while the gospel embraces both body and soul in 
its glorious provisions, while it stimulates industry and 



1 6 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

furnishes man with the best inspirations to the improve- 
ment of all his gifts, it forbids him to rest, for his chief 
good, in aught that is external and perishing ; and while 
it sanctifies his common blessings, and promotes his en- 
joyment of them, it tells him plainly, " You do not live 
by bread alone." There is a higher life than can be sup- 
plied by earthly things : it is for the attainment of this 
life that your existence is valuable. Subdue the earth, 
gather the increase of productive endeavor, have houses 
and lands and merchandise, and an abundance of all 
things that are desirable below, if you can fairly secure 
them, but do not make them the supreme end of your 
being. Your true life is not gained, nor essentially nour- 
ished, by these things. For that consists in greatness of 
soul, moral purity, spiritual elevation, affinities with the 
infinite mind, holiness, love. 

It was in the divine likeness that man was made, and 
to truly live it must be restored. If he is ambitious 
merely for the bread that perishes, the harvests of ten 
thousand acres do not supply the blessed life. He may 
count his buildings through streets of imperial magnifi- 
cence, and welcome his ships from every sea, and still, in 
a profound sense, be poorer than the beggar at his gate. 
The sumptuous embellishments of his house do not beau- 
tify the inner man, unless there shines into it the beauty 
of the Lord. The ver}^ luxuries of his opulence may ba 
savorless, if the spirit is smothered in sensuality and 
sloth. There is such a thing as mere existence, where 
the soul is treated with ignominious neglect, — starved, 
shut out from divine companionships, where every energy 



THE BREAD OF LIFE. 1 7 

of the individual is devoted to the earthly and perishable. 
But true life is not here. That must be begotten and fed 
from heavenly sources, and be blest with immortal fellow- 
ships. 

If there is any thing pitiable, it is the struggle of a man 
to satisfy his whole nature on that which was only in- 
tended to be a means of mere existence, and of quench- 
ing in darkness the light that graciously shines into him, 
through a blind idolatry of Mammon. That he does not 
live by bread alone he is conscious, if he have any capac- 
ity of spiritual recognition ; and even though one's career 
and character are ever so unworthy, there exists some 
appreciation of what is nobler and better. Ordinarily 
the life of the spirit is acknowledged " the more excel- 
lent way." Take the nearest illustrations : You see the 
voluptuary cloying his appetite with sensual pleasures, 
and the poor man stinting his daily meal that he may pro- 
vide suitable books for his studious child, and you ap- 
prove, instinctively, this deliberate self-denial. You note 
this youth, giddy and vacant-brained with enervating dis- 
sipation and folly, and another, ravished with the delights 
of classic literature and pursuing the paths of scientific 
inquiry with a reverent and exultant tread, and you say 
the scholar has chosen the better part. You mark the 
hard, stingy, close-fisted worldling, turning unmoved from 
the pleas of pathetic suffering, and the generous soul that 
sheds the light of charity all around it, and you revolt at 
that one's meanness and rejoice in this one's magnanim- 
ity. And so, too, when you have been conscious that 
some true heart was getting hope and strength through 



B 



FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 



your example ; or when by the ocean or on the mountain- 
top the splendors of the visible creation flowed into you, 
and in the great tide of refreshment that consecrated the 
hour you were lifted to a consciousness of a rarer fel- 
lowship and a more transcendent experience ; or when, 
through strong sympathy with bitter woe, you conquered 
selfishness and pain in helping a struggling and smitten 
life to peace, — you learned a more exquisite felicity, you 
lived a higher life than any that you found in gross enjoy- 
ment, or even in successful transactions in the marts of 
men. 

Yes, that life is highest which reaches furthest into 
the infinite Love, to whose consciousness are made the 
purest revelations, whose joys spring out of unsullied 
affections, whose sensibilities are most heavenly tem- 
pered, and which holds divine truth in the firmest 
grasp. 

Man may exist by the mere gratification of his lower 
nature, but he truly lives only by the word of God. And 
God speaks to him in all ways in v/hich His infinite 
glory and character and will are manifested and dis- 
covered. In one way it is through His works. '' For 
day unto day uttereth speech" of Him, " and night unto 
night showeth knowledge." Nature is His thought made 
visible. In the pictured glories of morning and evening, 
the pomp of seasons, the landscape's magnificence, the 
majestic harmony of the Cosmos, are manifold expres- 
sions, to man, of a divine intelligence. It is meant that 
he should read the stupendous lesson that is written all 
over the green earth and the wondrous sky, that the 



THE BREAD OF LIFE. 19 

loveliness of created things should refresh him ; that he 
should find in the order and uses and beauty of the uni- 
verse something to enlarge and uplift his nature, and 
transmit an impression of the All-creating, All-embracing 
Love to his exultant heart. Accept these tokens of wis- 
dom and goodness and power, taste the benediction that 
is shed forth in suns and seas, let the meaning of these 
wonderful forms and hues and melodies pass into your 
being, and you get a gracious nourishment and rest. 
" For the invisible things of Him from the creation of 
the world are clearly seen, being understood by the 
things that are made, even His eternal power and God- 
head.'' 

And so, too, He speaks in all that He inspires His 
children to do in harmony with His laws, in illustration 
of His boundless beneficence, in the spirit of His divine 
Son. All genuine science, all fair creations of ennobling 
art, all imperishable songs born in the vision of His love, 
all the rapt and adoring emotion that music interprets 
and breathes through her mystic lips, all deeds of beau- 
tiful valor and blessed sacrifice done in faith and strug- 
gling, and in the upward reach of the winged soul, all 
the gifts imparted by true prophetic hearts, by their 
sweet utterances and meek labors and holy martyr- 
doms, — whatever is sent to feed and solace and quicken 
the immortal nature, — all this is the language of the 
Lord to man. For the power to speak and do and 
suffer and conquer is from above. " Every good and 
perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the 
Father of Lights." He would have us live His life, and 



FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 



SO all that is suited to nourish it flows from Him in the 
wonderful channels through which the soul is touched 
and enlightened, and made strong. All true interpret- 
ers of His goodness are prophets to the soul. Every 
word that thrills with His benignity is sent from His 
heart. All sights where His glory is disclosed are utter- 
ances of His perfect thought. He feeds His adoring 
creatures in the radiance of His firmament, in the music 
of His universe, in the sympathies of the love that He 
puts into noble hearts, in the knowledge that shows 
man to himself, and teaches his uses and duties and 
destiny. 

It is in the Holy Scriptures, of course, that He speaks 
most directly and clearl}^, and with the most august and 
commanding emphasis, and still in no tone discordant 
with the language of His works. Here are given the 
enduring portraitures of His amazing condescension and 
grace, the epitomes of His love, the verities of His infinite 
salvation. In the gospel of the Lord Jesus are summed 
up and, concentrated the surpassing truths of life. "For 
in these last days,'^ says the Apostle, " He has spoken to 
us by His Son, whom He has made heir of all things, by 
whom He created the worlds, who was the brightness of 
His glory and the express image of His person." It is, 
then, chiefly in the disclosure of Himself in Christ that 
we have the true life for the soul, the bread from heaven, 
the unwasting, divine nourishment in which is holiness, 
beatification, joy. And so the written word penned by 
men, as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, is life-giv- 
ing and sustaining, because through it the spiritual man 



THE BREAD OF LIFE, 



comes in contact with the Infinite, learns the mysteries 
of heavenly wisdom, feeds on the uncreated Love ; in a 
word, because it discloses the Life Christ Jesus to the 
heart. It is the medium through which God speaks to 
the soul, shines in upon it, awakens its high susceptibili- 
ties, and replenishes it with divine supplies. 

Hence the glory and preciousness of the written word 
are in its being the vessel of such glorious treasures, the 
key that opens up the knowledge and the joy of God. It 
is the spirit, not the letter, that makes its transcendent 
value. It may be obscured by superstition, dogmatism, 
ecclesiasticism, the conventionalities of sect and system. 
Its sacred voices may be drowned or disguised by bigotry, 
priestcraft, intolerance, sensuality, and the pride of knowl- 
edge. In the hands of Pharisaic and legal righteousness 
it may yield no quickening, life-giving food. But still it 
points the way to it. It unfolds the source of it. It 
bears the message of it to those who will hear. There, 
in the golden volume, the most practical questions of 
our existence are answered, the highest possible type 
of character and living delineated, human destiny de- 
scribed, and life and immortality brought to light. There 
can be nothing more intensely practical than the truth 
which it is its province to impart ; and it is getting the 
deep meanings of the divine love, the sense of God with 
man, the enlightening of the true Light, the strength that 
is breathed into the heart, assured of forgiven sin and 
the boundless and present sympathy of the Lord, that 
makes the word of God the life of man, — that makes 
him live. For he truly lives, as he feels that he can con- 



2 2 FROM ADVENT TO LENT 

quer the evil that besets him, as he rises up to duty in 
the inspiration of a great hope, as he knows the quick- 
ening of a love larger and richer than his dream, as his 
being takes hold of a certainty of blessedness, surviving 
suns and years, as he is led to a peace of heart that, 
resting on the divine heart, is pure and strong. He 
lives in the ardors of his better aspirations, in the in- 
sights of a clearer and more reverent intelligence, in the 
affinities of holier, sweeter affections, as the discords of 
sin die in the inflowing of the heavenly harmonies. 
Every word of God inspires and feeds this life, however 
it is transmitted, however brought to the spiritual intel- 
ligence. 

And he interprets best the sacred volume who brings 
the sweetest, most convincing sense of Christ to the 
heart, who helps the soul to grasp in most affectionate 
embrace the everlasting Goodness which delights to 
renew and comfort and save. It*is possible that a 
gracious instruction may come in the lovely innocence 
of a child, for of such is the kingdom of heaven. It may 
come in the holy example of a sainted friend, winning 
you to ways of virtue. It may come in the strong sym- 
pathies of one who takes you in the arms of a prevailing 
faith clear to the heart of Jesus ; for in these ways and 
the like the spirit of goodness reaches you. 

So, on the other hand, the gracious word may not 
come to you in pages of learned dissertation, in ponder- 
ous discourses, musty with an antiquated scholasticism. 
God speaks now^ and whatever startles your conscience 
into vigorous exercise, whatever flashes light to reveal 



THE BREAD OF LIFE, 23 

His love, or shows yourself to yourself so as to impel you 
to the cross, or helps you carry cheerfully your load, 
and to live patiently and purely, as seeing Him who is 
invisible, while you wait for the glory that shall be re- 
vealed, is from Him. 

As respects the matter of preaching, there must neces- 
sarily be a great variety of it, both in the topics presented 
and in the manner of their treatment, to say nothing of 
its degrees of excellence. But where there is a supreme 
intent to benefit the soul, where there is the earnestness 
that springs from profound conviction, let none censure. 
However noble and gracious the utterance, not all who 
listen will hear with the same ears, not all will be fed 
alike, not all will equally respond to the voice that ap- 
peals to the inward and the eternal. But so long as the 
good news is proclaimed, though in different keys, it 
shall not be in vain. As in sacred music there are 
many different tunes that inspire or express devotion, 
so preaching may be marked by great variety and still 
achieve a blessed end. It is the perfunctory perform- 
ance — the vain repetition of sacred phrases and formu- 
las without the awful sense of the divineness of what 
ministers to souls — that falls dead. While nothing that 
truly instructs in what is of human utility, or appeals to 
the spiritual sense with a view of moral improvement, is 
to be undervalued, that preaching is to be most prized 
which is most powerful to beget and nourish the divine 
love, and hence the divine life. Man needs something 
more for his spiritual growth than solemn cautions, 
negations, the knowledge of penalties, the recital of 



24 FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 

facts relating to his ordinary worldly interests. He 
preaches best who makes divine realities most impres- 
sive to human consciousness. We need frequent uplift- 
ings to clearer and purer atmospheres, profound stirrings 
of soul, the sweet and holy impulses that are given by a 
sense of the nearness, yea, the presence of God. To 
advance toward the higher stature of the perfect man, to 
ripen in heavenly graces, is the Christian's ambition. 
Whatever the variety of our experience or growth or 
knowledge may be, we need such a contact with Christ 
as shall enable us to follow joyfully His blessed steps. 
Enough all the while is tempting us astray, is blinding 
us to the imperishable good, is clogging the free, true 
movement of the heavenward life. Just as the physical 
man requires daily food, that he maintain his vigor, so 
does the immortal nature its divine supplies. The eager- 
ness with which you hear what ministers to the higher 
life will be measured by the sincerity of your desire to 
have your life hid with Christ in God. 

In all your bestments and woes, in all your struggles 
and hopes, and questionings and fears, you can surely 
tell whether any thing vital and helpful reaches you from 
lips that speak of sacred things. You know, indeed, 
when the quickening word comes to your hungry soul. 
You know what makes you stronger to bear and to toil 
on. You know what makes the horizon of life brighter, 
and sin more hateful, and holiness more attractive, and 
the invisible glory more real. There is a divine com- 
munication here. The Holy Spirit has shone on the 
dark letter, has imparted a gracious message, has sent 



THE BREAD OF LIFE. 25 

the healing'comfort, and lifted up the hands that hung 
down, and strengthened the feeble knees. Life has 
come, for the spirit of life is there. And you get no 
good from ministration, from prayer, or pulpit, or ser- 
vice, unless that Holy Spirit convey something vital to 
your spiritual sense. It is the heavenly bread that we 
hunger for, if there is any life in us. We want the assur- 
ance of the divine sympathy, the refreshments and grace 
of the divine love. We want to get the victory over our 
weaknesses and fears and sins, and the assaulting evils 
that hedge us round. It is larger life — the freedom of 
higher affections, clearer insight, a mightier force of the 
obedient will, a purer heart, and a closer fellowship 
with the Lord of love and life — that we desire. Give 
us some word throbbing with the meanings of God, 
O preacher of the good news ! Bring not for me the 
husks of dogma and the vague tradition of things sacred. 
Utter not for me the cant of ecclesiastical routine, of 
sect, and shibboleth, and ism. Away with the clatter of 
profitless controversy, and the dead effigies of sacerdotal 
pretence and trickery and gaud 1 It is a word from 
God that I want, — a word that shall inspire my hope, 
and shame my meanness, and smite away my conceit, 
and touch me with the awful joy of ai divine Deliverer and 
an infinite Friend. I am set amid a strange universe ; I 
am crowded with spiritual foes ; I shudder at the brood- 
ing mystery of life and death ; I would escape the thralls 
and the blight of sin ; I hunger for the imperishable good, 
for light, and the blessedness of the skies. Speak to me 
out of the infinite measures of grace and power ; show 
2 



26 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

me how I may know God and live. Ah ! it is shown in 
Him, who came down to us in the brightness of the 
Father's glory, who lived and suffered and died, and 
rose triumphant to the fruitions of the Godhead, our 
Saviour, Lord, and Life. " He came that we might have 
life, and that we might have it more abundantly.'' 

This is the significance of His gospel. The word in 
its fulness and manifold applications is for us living men 
in the living present. We are not to hear it, to read it, 
to ponder it, as something which was merely true once, 
as if the gifts of God and the disclosures of His grace 
pertained only to the men and the generations that are 
gone. He is a living God, an unchangeable God, and 
His word, in all its varied tones of cheer and inspiration 
and life, is to us to-day, in our cares and sins and troubles 
and infirmities. What dried the tears of the afflicted, and 
gave heroic endurance to believers of old, can do the 
same for us. What was true for those who walked 
with God centuries ago, may be true for His children 
now. If you will but hear, there is a gracious message 
for you that your deepest nature can understand. 

Yes, there is a word of comfort to you, O soul groping 
in the desolation of your strange bereavement; and hope 
for you, weary one, though you grow faint in your rough 
pilgrimage ; and peace to you, who, feeling the hurt and 
shame of sin, long for deliverance ; and victory to you all, 
who rest on the mighty heart that feels with you, and 
imparts the pulsations of its glorious life. God is with 
us — Emmanuel — the Lord our righteousness. To-day, 
if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts. And 



THE BREAD OF LIFE. 27 

while ever looking to Him as the author and finisher of 
your faith, give an eager ear to all that has the savor of 
His spirit. Refuse no life-giving truth because it bears 
not the label of some favorite name. Whatever is food 
for the immortal life, accept as from above. There is 
but one fountain of good. The Spirit has a variety of 
administrations, but there is the same Lord. Seek the 
bread that does not perish. " Life is more than meat, 
and the body more than raiment.'* Every word of God 
is nourishing to the soul. But our Lord is the Eter- 
nal Word, — the true bread that cometh down from 
heaven. 



^^ Prepare ye the way of the Lord,^^ • 

Matthew iii. 3. 

'^The Lord is at hand^ 

Philippians iv. 5. 



III. 

PREPARATION FOR A HAPPY CHRISTMAS. 

'T^HE Christmas season is close at hand, and our 
hearts naturally run forward to its sacred mean- 
ings and joys. There are few, indeed, in a Christian 
land who do not think of it wdth a peculiar interest ; 
for whatever men's opinions or lives may be, there is a 
light about Christmas of an unwonted lustre, and asso- 
ciations gather there that touch a tender place, if there 
is one left in the heart. But that the blessed time may 
be what it ought to be to us, that it may be truly a 
season of holy joy, there is need that we be duly pre- 
pared for it. So glorious a reality as Christ in our 
midst, as the appearing in the flesh of the Lord of 
Light, as the birth among us of the divine child,- — the 
fact of Emmanuel, — cannot be appreciated and enjoyed, 
as is meet, unless w^e are brought to a proper state to 
see the glory of the heavenly manifestation, and to re- 
ceive the wondrous grace of the gift of God. All that 
is most excellent in the wide scope of life's possibilities, 
all that is most precious in hopes that survive time and 
death, are intimately connected with Him whose nativity 
was ushered in by the angelic strain, "Glory to God in 
the highest, on earth peace, good- will to men.'' To 
be blind to the sublime disclosure of His love, to be 



30 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

unmoved by the displays of His relationship to us, and 
all that fidelity to such a condition imposed and illus- 
trated, of course hinders any such welcome of His 
appearing as shall insure an effectual benefit and an 
inspiring joy. It is for us to put ourselves in the best 
attitudes for beholding His glory, in the best frame for 
appreciating His divine purpose and character, and for 
receiving the significance of the good news which has 
filled the earth with such a blessed light. We are to 
make ready for such a reception of Him as shall be 
refreshing to our hopes, as shall be gloriously inspir- 
ing and invigorating to our lives. It is impossible to 
leap from a carnal and earthy state into the blessed par- 
ticipation of Christmas joy, — impossible to grasp the 
real meaning of Christ with men, if the sensual, selfish, 
uncharitable spirit reigns in us. Christ is coming. He 
comes as a babe into the world ; bringing all that is 
innocent, pure, and lovely to our firesides and homes. 
He comes to walk with us as a friend in the darkest 
and brightest ways with sympathy and support and 
cheer. He comes to lead us graciously to our Father ; 
taking the curse of our sins, and suffering for our 
offences. He comes giving hope and consolation to 
the weary ones ; conquering death, shining in upon life 
with a glory of love that makes time and eternity radi- 
ant, and standing the personal brother of every soul 
that will receive Him. It is something exceedingly 
great and beautiful to have such a visitor, — to be hon- 
ored with such a guest. So, I say, to realize what our 
privilege is, to accept our great blessing, it is essential 



PREPARA TION FOR A HAPPY CHRISTMAS, 3 1 

that we be found in a state of readiness. We are to 
prepare for His appearing. 

You all know with what an interest you prepare for 
the reception of a friend whom you highly honor and 
love and revere. You look forward to the visit with 
happy thoughts, and the expected pleasure gives interest 
to all that you do in the plans and preparations for the 
loved and welcome guest. As you arrange the room 
for the visitor, you think, " What will be most suitable 
and agreeable ; what will make the hours of rest and 
leisure most interesting ; what will insure the happiest 
stay?" So you make provision for the table that will 
be most palatable ; you put away whatever you deem 
offensive ; you arrange your affairs so that you can give 
your time to the pleasant fellowship that is to be renewed. 
In deciding upon entertainments that will signalize the 
occasion, in setting the house in order, in placing books 
here and flowers there, and settling all the little con- 
veniences, you consult the taste of your friend ; and 
there is a peculiar kind of enjoyment in the very act of 
doing what you know is so highly deserved, and which 
will be so thoroughly appreciated. 

Now, for a truly " Happy Christmas " a similar pre- 
paration must be made, but made in the heart and 
life. The Christmas anthem is loud, with strains of 
peace and good-will. The manger of Bethlehem is a 
picture unshadowed by the frowns of malice and revenge. 
All the suggestions there are of condescension, mercy, 
love. No one is prepared for a happy Christmas who 
carries grudges, envies, ill-will, hatred in his heart. 



32 FROM ADVENT TO LENT 

The whole career of Christ on earth is an illustration 
of that patience which is never disheartened, of love 
that suffers long and is kind, that is easy to be entreated, 
and that bears all things in its purpose to save. In 
Him is the pattern of forgiveness and mercy. " Blessed 
are the peace-makers," He says. *' Be ye merciful, as your 
Father in heaven is merciful.'' The bitter and revenge- 
ful spirit cannot know Him. And yet how in their 
strifes and disputes, their selfishness and their ambi- 
tions, this evil spirit is engendered among men. How 
many foully suspect each other, cherish malignant an- 
tipathies, hate each other. How many let some slights 
or affronts fester into dark hostilities, and so imbitter 
their very souls. How many stand apart through real 
or fancied unkindness who ought to be friends. There 
are those who profess to be followers of the lowly and 
forgiving Jesus, who year after year maintain an unfor- 
giving temper, and who fail to make any advances to heal 
old breaches of confidence and regard. Now what can 
be more unlovely than such a spirit, — more discordant 
with the mind of Christ ? With such a disposition there 
can be no hearty enjoyment of the large, generous, for- 
giving mind of the Lord. None who keep hatred in 
their hearts, who nourish grudges and enmities, can get 
into the atmosphere of Christ's charity. They are un- 
happy with all their affected pride and coldness and 
disdain. The sore aches within, and they know that 
the animosity which they cherish towards others reacts 
painfully upon themselves. To enjoy the sweetness of 
Christmas, they must put away their ill-will. Their 



PREPARATION FOR A HAPPY CHRISTMAS, 'TiZ 

hands must be held out in forgiveness. They must look 
into the faces of men as upon brothers. They must 
bury their hatreds as something offensive to Heaven. 
Then are they prepared to see better the sympathy of 
the Lord that envelops all mankind. Then are they 
brought where the looks of the young child show the 
trust, the holy peace, the engaging beauty of love. Let 
a man get rid of the bad feeling that so worries and 
irritates him, let him find again the place that he once 
had with his friend who was alienated from him, let 
him feel that there is no soul on earth to whom he does 
not wish well, let him fairly rejoice in all the happiness 
that he sees in the lives of his fellows, who have been 
more fortunate in a worldly point than he has, and he 
sees the Christmas light falling with wonderful sweet- 
ness all over the earth. Enemies seem to be recon- 
ciled. Friends that stood apart seem running together. 
Hands that were raised to strike clasp in love. The 
vipers of prejudice and malice seem gliding away to the 
pit. Something inexpressibly lovely beams all over 
the ways of men. For such a one beholds the infinite 
mercy of Heaven in the disclosure of Christ. The whole 
air of Christmas is tender and pure and clear and 
musical with the spirit of compassion. There must 
then be a forgiving spirit to appreciate the blessed joys 
of the nativity. 

Akin to this, as a preparation for the enjoyment of 
the sacred time, is practical benevolence. God's great 
gift to us, " Unto us a Child is born, to us a Son is given, 
and His name shall be called Emmanuel," is the reahty 

2* c 



34 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

that we celebrate. The bright associations of the day 
are of giving, — giving out of tenderness and sympathy, 
giving out of love and a sense of gratitude, giving through 
sacrifice in the strong confidence of bringing some 
pleasure to a human heart. In the glorious illustration 
of the divine love we take our cue in making some 
testimony of interest in those who are dear to us. But 
the spirit that apprehends Christmas most fully goes 
beyond mere family regard. It must pass the limit of 
personal friendship. It must give something, where it 
can, to make want less bitter and affliction less keen. 
If there is a heart whose wounds you have any power 
to staunch, if there is penury that you might relieve, 
if there is a loneliness of age and suffering that you 
might irradiate, if there is a single needy and deserving 
one whose days you might cheer by something from 
your sympathy and your possessions, then it is for you 
to do it in the spirit of Him who condescended to your 
mortal infirmities, and who bore, out of His great love 
for you, an infinite sorrow. If there is a season of the 
whole year when one can be touched by human woes 
and made to respond to the cry of distress, it is surely 
at the time when heaven and earth are jubilant with the 
news of the Messiah's birth. Go forth to the lowly 
abode of the needy with the aid that shall make glad- 
ness, at least for a day; send your gift abroad wheie 
you know there is famine and almost despair ; sustain 
by your voice and benefaction the pleading cause of 
your own parish ; cheer some sinking mind that has 
nobly labored, yet has failed to be recognized or encour- 



PREPARATION FOR A HAPPY CHRISTMAS, 35 

aged ; share your comforts and luxuries with one unused 
to human sympathy, yet is perishing for relief,; do some- 
thing that shall illustrate the spirit of sacrifice and 
brotherhood, — and you shall realize a more glorious 
meaning of Christ with men. There shall be more 
wonderful beauty in the face of the infant Jesus. A 
holier radiance shall fall, not only over the Judean 
landscape, but all over the earth wherever there is a 
human heart. The Lord shall seem nearer in your 
fellowship with man, in your glow of sympathy, in the 
elasticity of spirit glad in doing good, in the participa- 
tion that you have with that charity that flows out of the 
heart of God. You shall more fully understand the 
motive and the methods of grace, and a better hope 
shall glow, as you look abroad, in every human home. 
Christmas has a blessed cheer to those who serve ; and 
if you would have it bright with an uncommon glory, 
imitate your Lord. Go, as He did, on errands of mercy ; 
suffer something, if need be, for a benevolent cause ; 
feel that you are useful in your day and place ; that you 
are not living merely for yourself, that you have an 
interest in all that makes man better and happier; 
actually impart a gift where there is a strong necessity, 
— and the season shall have an unwonted preciousness. 
If we do not secure its great blessings, it is because we 
do not make ready for them. With the pulse of charity 
bounding high, with a generosity that casts rich gifts 
on the altar, with a self-forgetfulness elate with the new 
hope that dawns in gloomy homes and rough ways, 
Christmas shall be gloriously glad. 



36 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

But Still further, to prepare for a joyful Christmas a 
pure heart is necessary. When you make ready for 
your honored friend, you are careful that the room pro- 
vided for your guest shall be peculiarly inviting. Not 
only would you have it cleanly and fair, but all its sug- 
gestions pleasant. You arrange the furniture, the books, 
and pictures, and flowers, — every thing, so that an air 
of sweetness may prevail. So in preparing for the 
greater guest, the divine visitor, with what diligence 
should one eliminate from his mind all that is offensive 
to pure eyes. With what scrupulous care should he 
search his conscience that sin be not entertained. How 
critically should he consider his life in the light of duty 
and privilege. How pure and clean should he seek to 
have his heart in the presence of the Holy One. With 
what openness, with what sincerity, with what reverence 
and love should he make ready to welcome the I^ord. 
But to do this he cannot be idle and unconcerned. He 
cannot be neglectful and inconsiderate. It will not do 
for him to think that all in a moment, in the confusion 
of his worldly engagements, in his material absorption, 
in his lust of carnal pleasures, in his greediness for gain, 
he can turn without effort and behold the Lord in His 
nearness and excellence and surpassmg grace, and 
rejoice in Him with exceeding joy. No. For this great 
blessing the spiritual eye must have its films removed. 
There must be opened within the soul ample space for 
the heavenly guest. The welcome must be prepared. 
And this cannot be done without self-denial and s^lf- 
consecration ; cannot be done unless the bonds of sin 



PREPARATION FOR A HAPPY CHRISTMAS. 37 

are broken and the hunger for righteousness is begotten. 
There must be prayer as a habit of life. A devout 
frame must be cultivated that loves to meditate on what 
is divine. There must be driven from the heart the imps 
of unbelief and sensuality and pride and vain desire. 
The glorious things that are promised must be dear, 
and so dear that they seem like realities in the strong 
apprehensions of faith. There must be a consciousness 
of that which is imperishable, and life must be flung 
steadfastly upon God amid temptation and trial. Let 
one thus find freedom in the liberty of a son in the 
kingdom of grace j let him be animated with holy ambi- 
tions ; let him feel that his way is heavenward, and that 
the evil of his nature is more and more purged away by 
the Sanctifier, as he lives in the refreshing sense of 
heavenly things, — and Christmas shall be radiant and 
sweet with an inexpressible delight. Then he shall 
look on the cradle of the Holy Child with eyes that see 
far into the ch^ity of Heaven. The earth shall blossom 
and sing in the shining of the sun of righteousness. 
All over time and the ages and eternity shall gleam the 
hopes of a heavenly fruition. The strains of angel an- 
thems are swelled by his own song of rejoicing. 

It is our own fault if Christmas does not bring to us 
a blessed cheer. But the same preparation which will 
insure an inspiring joy in the holy festival is needed to 
make life satisfying and triumphant. There are no 
methods of successful living equal to those set forth 
in the gospel. Our gains wdll be only temporary, 
our pleasures deceitful, our lives a failure, unless we 



38 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

follow the counsels of infinite wisdom, and are par- 
takers of the mind of the Master. With the thralls 
of sin broken, with the spiritual sense keen and alert, 
with love our controlling principle, with the graces of 
the Spirit the supreme treasures of the soul, the man is 
sure of a glorious harvest. Not surer do the blossoms 
of spring come up in the favoring soil and climate than 
does joy spring out of the obedient and consecrated 
heart. Going forth among men with a strong friend- 
ship for virtue, with a charity that endures and forgives, 
wath generosities that shed light and help where there 
is sore need, with a spirit that lives in communion with 
holy things, with a faith that realizes the divine nearness 
and benignity, you are gathering something all the while 
that is precious and everlasting. In what you do to 
make others better and happier, you are yourself en- 
riched. As you show more of the pure, forgiving, 
blameless mind of the Lord, you are enabled to see 
more of His excellence. The light that shines out of 
your magnanimity, your fidelities to truth and honor, 
your sacrifices and faith, make your own way clearer to 
the infinite good. By your devotion, your integrity, your 
large-hearted sympathy with the cause of humanity, you 
are more and more identified with Him who gave Him- 
self for us. And so your fellowship is closer with Him, 
and the invisible kingdom is the chief reality in which 
you rejoice. Preparing well for the appreciation and 
enjoyment of Christmas is preparing well for a faithful 
service of the Lord. And this is to be continued from 
day to day while life endures. But there is an advan- 



PREPARATION FOR A HAPPY CHRISTMAS, 39 

tage in realizing vividly the wonderful measures of the 
divine good-will, in an experience which shall quicken 
every attribute of the soul to vigorous activity. As he 
who from some high elevation looking forth over the 
glorious landscape appreciates better its loveliness than 
he could by standing down amid the fogs of the valley 
before the sun dispelled them, so he who is lifted in the 
ardors of love and duty to the high places of spiritual 
observation sees more that charms his heart and encour- 
ages him to a faithful discipleship. Make your Christ- 
mas what it should be by a forgiving temper, by works 
of charity, by a purity of heart in which the Holy Spirit 
has His abode, and in the inspirations of your joy you 
shall be set forward with swifter impulse in the way of 
life. The horizon of Christian privilege shall enlarge. 
Your burdens shall be lighter, humanity shall be dearer, 
life shall have higher significance, you shall carry for- 
ward the sweet thought of Christ with men into your 
work and trials, and a holier atmosphere shall ensphere 
your soul. Our hindrance is our worldliness and our 
unbelief. Alas for blind eyes and hard hearts, and 
ambitions that seek simply what is earthy and perish- 
ing ! Alas for our conceit of self and unrepented sin, 
that besets and cripples us ! We must break these bonds 
of evil sovereignty, and find the blessed liberty of love. 
We must put on the garments of holiness that we may 
give due welcome to the Lord. We must be like the 
wise virgins, ready in heart for the Redeemer's coming. 
The Lord is at hand. 



' The babe lying in a manger, ^^ 

Luke ii. i6. 



IV. 

THE BABE LYING IN A MANGER. 

T^HE picture that these words suggest is a very hum- 
ble one, and yet it has in its relations and signifi- 
cance a grandeur and glory that dwarf all other events 
of time. An ordinary stable of an oriental hostelry, a 
youthful couple in plain attire, and a young child cradled 
in a manger, — nothing to the casual beholder but indi- 
cations of uninfluential position, lowly pursuits, poverty, 
a cheerless life ; and yet here were the treasures of 
riches, power, knowledge, that could make the world 
glorious. That manger contained the world's life and 
hope. That infant was to conquer the nations and 
kingdoms of the whole earth. From that shed was to 
go a light in which an erring and wretched race could 
find the way to God. That babe had the key to all 
human hearts. Before Him royalty was to lay its 
crowns, and learning its treasures, and wealth its 
precious substance, and ambition its lordliest trophies. 
His lips were to utter truths that should break the power 
of tyranny and caste, and dispel the mists of supersti- 
tion. On His heart were to be laid the burdens of 
innumerable sorrows. Up to His face were to look the 
myriads who hunger for help and consolation. From 
those veins now throbbing with infantile life was to flow 



42 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

the blood of an all-sufficient sacrifice. Surely God has 
visited His people. Glad tidings of great joy have come. 
The light to lighten the Gentiles has dawned. The 
promise to the fathers is fulfilled. This child is 
Emmanuel, — God with us. And the miracle of His 
birth is only the preliminary of the miracle that has 
been wrought, and is ever being wrought, by His glorious 
gospel. For this gospel is verily the power of God. Its 
fundamental principle is love. * It starts in humiliation, 
poverty, apparent weakness. It vindicates its divineness 
and power in sacrifice. It wins by giving. It conquers 
by dying. Could a clearer testimony of its intention to 
reach to the lowest conditions of society be given than 
by the Prince of Peace in the manger ? Could there be 
a more thorough divestment of what the world regards 
as its means of success and honor than this child in His 
weakness, poverty, destitution of influential relations and 
friends ? 

But here are the symbols of its strength and success 
and sovereignty. The Lord of Life assumes this human 
condition. The Divine is incarnate in the form of a 
servant. There are humiliation, lowly labors, sacrifice. 
There is love pure and perfect in its gifts and ministries. 
There is an absence of material instrumentalities, of 
splendid state and circumstance, a giving away of self, 
a dying for man. This is the fact briefly of Christianity. 
Its history begins in the stable at Bethlehem. Its 
founder wanders throughout His native country poor 
and homeless. He dies as a malefactor. A few fisher- 
men proclaim the principles which He taught them. 



THE BABE LYING IN A MANGER, 43 

Men who had given up the world, and who had no cre- 
dentials of authority but their call to promulgate the 
gospel, go about from land to land preaching a crucified 
and risen Saviour. They bring no testimonials from 
royal personages. They make no boast of distinguished 
erudition. They appeal to no ancestral influence. They 
get no support from military commanders or civic digni- 
taries. They have the prestige of no illustrious ser- 
vices. They can make no show of worldly affluence or 
honors. What they say conflicts with the pride and 
passions and appetites of man. Their style of living is 
an affront to the popular taste and ambitions. Their 
doctrines are an assault on polytheistic superstitions 
and philosophic conceit. The principles that they in- 
culcate sap the foundations of imperialism and eat away 
the fetters of slavery. All that the predominant popu- 
lar opinion deems desirable is accounted by them as 
unprofitable and vain. What men greedily seek they 
condemn. The pleasures, the amusements, the osten- 
tation, the power, the philosophy, the governments, the 
caste, the oflicial station of the world, — all are in col- 
lision with this gospel. Society had no sympathy with 
them, its ministers. Csesarism was hostile to them. 
Human learning was offended at them. The appetites 
of men could not tolerate their spirituality and austerities. 
What did they have with which to cope with all the 
elements of a corrupt and mighty world ? What could 
inspire in them a courage suflicient to prosecute their 
hazardous mission ? What resources did they possess 
adequate to their sublime venture ? Ah ! it was because 



44 FROM ADVENT TO LENT 

they had the spirit of this Master that they went forth 
and sowed the good seed of the divine word. Yet still 
it was out of poverty, human weakness, humility, sac- 
rifice, brotherhood, love, that they continued to min- 
ister. 

And what was the result ? Why, Christianity gradu- 
ally permeated society by its light. Power became docile. 
Wealth opened its coffers to its uses. Philosophy revised 
its doctrines or abandoned them. Heathenism burned 
its idols. Sensualism crucified its lusts. Learning be- 
came meek and lowly in heart. The chains of slavery 
fell asunder. The amphitheatres of brutal pastimes 
were dismantled. A new code of morals took the place of 
the old. A new inspiration animated the industries of 
men. Their ambitions took new channels. Human think- 
ing and living were converted. This Christianity — which 
was so despised in its servants, whose earthy estate was 
so poor, which was so destitute of the accepted symbols 
and circumstance of success — marched forward and 
entered the heart and brain of the civilized world. It 
took possession of the seats of learning. It overthrew 
the palaces of licentious revelry. It wielded the scep- 
tre of emperors, unlocked the prisons of despotism, 
made gardens of desert places, filled the earth with the 
blossoms of an immortal hope and the odors of a divine 
charity. From a despised sect, that were cast out of 
synagogues and hunted by military officials, the church 
became a great company, controlling the thought and 
industries, if not the legislation, of the world. It filled 
the Orient with its temples. It made the great cities 



THE BABE LYING IN A MANGER, 45 

Antioch, Corinth, Alexandria, Carthage, Ephesus, Con- 
stantinople, centres of its light and power. It mounted 
the throne of the Caesars and made imperial Rome the 
dispenser of its gospel. And so north and south along 
the shores of Africa, and to Gaul and Scandinavia and 
Britain, the truth planted its standards, and the gospel 
won noble and peasant, king and serf, till its symbols 
were acknowledged and nations vitalized by its life. 
Here is a great fact which no gainsayer can deny. Out 
of that word proclaimed by the Galilean peasant, His 
life and death, rose this great organized Christian body, 
containing the virtues, the culture, the learning, the 
sovereignty of the civilized world. In its power, I re- 
peat, old customs died, old superstitions were abolished, 
old wrongs and abominations were extirpated, old enmi- 
ties and tyrannies and cruelties ceased. The thought, 
the heart, the life of the leaders of society, government, 
art, learning, religion, were converted. A new impulse 
was given to the race. There was a regeneration of 
hope, of affections, of aim, of work, of life itself. Here 
is the standing miracle. The transformations of man- 
kind, the higher direction of their civilization, the scope 
of their charity, the spirit of their laws, the safeguards 
of their liberties, the sanctities of their homes, the insti- 
tutions that illustrate the presence of a true brotherhood 
and the recognition of a heavenly fatherhood, all, in- 
deed, that is sweetest and best in the possession of the 
race, — • show the potency of that divine element which 
Christ introduced into the world. What to human eyes 
seemed weak, destitute of powerful resources, despised 



46 FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 

from its lack of worldly ostentation and patronage, 
became mighty, through God, to the dominion of the 
world. The colossal systems of error ; the philosophies 
and polytheisms of the world, with all their prestige ; the 
evils that seemed throned on invincible power, — could 
not stand before the truth of the Galilean. Love, 
humility, purity, sacrifice, were mightier than armed 
legions and the monstrous iniquities of heathenism. 
Let those who quibble and dispute about the miraculous 
advent of Christ explain the facts of a Christianity 
which contains the very kernel of the world's good, 
before they turn away in scornful unbelief. Here is a 
miracle illustrated before our very eyes. Instead of 
our bowing in temples of a pure religion to-day, instead 
of the comfort of Christian homes, instead of our glori- 
ous liberties and the opportunities that invite our suc- 
cessful effort on every hand, why are we not crushed by 
an irresponsible despotism, enveloped in the darkness 
of barbaric ignorance 1 Why are we not now cringing 
before miserable idols, or casting our children to horrid 
monsters, or exhausting and embittering life by foolish 
mortifications, or trying to kill every sweet and true 
instinct of our souls, in the hope of conciliating some 
imaginary god.'* Why are we not the dupes of some 
powerful impostor, cheated, harried, tormented, with no 
hope and no redress? It is because of the glorious 
gospel of Christ actualized on €arth. It is because 
Christmas is the great fact in the history of the race j 
because God is with us, — Christ the power of God and 
the wisdom of God. The Christian ages are the best 



THE BABE LYING IN A MANGER, 47 

vindicator of the claims of the Messiah. All that is 
written in the love and sacrifice and nobilities of men ; 
the great deeds that embalm the years, the spirit that has 
made sweet the homes and lives of mankind, — all this 
is but a page of the Christianity that was born with the 
Prince of Peace. The race has been conserved by it. 
What is fairest and best and most gracious on earth 
has been inspired by it. There is not a principle that 
is most valuable in our governments, not a sentiment 
that is most precious in our literature and hearts, but is 
saturated with its grace. The affections that are sacred, 
the activities that are benign and helpful, all get their 
light and beauty and vitality from this wondrous 
child. Trace up to their fountain whatever gives the 
richest flavor to your life, and you will find that it is 
associated with the great reality which we celebrate to- 
day. God has disclosed His good-will to men. In 
the most affecting and gracious manner possible He has 
visited us. The way of blessed life He has made known, 
and the principles that insure our everlasting good. 
Christ a babe in swaddling-clothes, Christ conquering 
the tempter, Christ making bright the marriage festival 
and bringing comfort to the house of mourning, Christ 
healing the sick and the insane, shedding His sympathy 
into homes of poverty and wretchedness, planting the 
seeds of new life in souls that were stained and dark- 
ened, pointing the heart to the treasures of an everlast- 
ing blessedness, taking unto Himself the sins and 
sorrows of a world, and putting death and hell under 



48 FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 

His feet in His resurrection triumph, — in all this 
humiliation and mercy and sacrifice and gift we have 
an attestation of the divine power and charity which 
demonstrates the sublime benignity of the gospel. We 
can ask nothing more or better to assure us of the glo- 
rious meaning and destiny of life, and the resources 
of its elevation and blessedness. A sympathizing Sav- 
iour, a suffering Saviour, a redeeming Saviour ; a Sav- 
iour victorious over sin and sorrow and death ; a Saviour 
showing the likeness of God, and the power of God, and 
the way to God, and the joy of God ; a Saviour entering 
in to our humanity, bearing our burdens, tasting our woes, 
expiating our offences, and pouring the tides of His re- 
newing and refreshing love into our hearts, — this is 
what Christmas tells us, this is the inspiration of our 
rejoicing. 

And so the story never grows old from age to age, 
never ceases to have the charm and the sweetness that 
it had to our youthful hearts. No tone of the angels' 
anthem in the skies of Bethlehem fades as the years go 
on. No lustre of the star that hung over the " place 
where the young child was '' wanes, however dark our 
night. The voice that whispered to so many " thy sins 
be forgiven thee,'' that called so many to better and 
happier paths, that caused the broken-hearted to forget 
their woes in the coming of an immortal joy, that bade 
nature's turbulence subside, and in the hour of sacrifi- 
cial agony said " it is finished," — that voice comes to us 
as tender, as convincing, as divine, with its healing grace 



THE BABE LYING IN A MANGER, 49 

and comforting balm, as to the myriads who have heard it 
and rejoiced. And we, too, rejoice; for to us a child is 
born, to us a son is given, the dayspring from on high has 
visited us. Yes, the Sun of righteousness has arisen v/ith, 
healing in His wings. Christ comes to our homes and 
hearts, to our lonely and sorrowing paths, to our festive 
scenes and toilsome ways ; comes to awake the filial love 
to our Father who is in heaven, to draw our feet up- 
ward to the heavenly life, to plant immortal flowers in 
our desert places, and make strong our hands for a holy 
service ; comes to shed upon life the cheer of immortal 
friendships and imperishable hopes, to sweeten our years 
with the odors of His paradise, and to enrich us with the 
graces of His own loving and untainted spirit. We can 
welcome Him to-day as our elder brother, as our truest 
friend, as our sympathizing high priest, as the light of our 
hearts and habitations, as the life in which our own 
being is renewed, ennobled, made strong. We can 
stand around His cradle and pour out our offerings of 
gratitude and praise ; we can gather around Him to hear 
the words of life and witness the wonders of His love. 
We can touch the hem of His garment : yes, feel the pulses 
of His loving heart in the sincerity of a faith that hun- 
gers for purity and peace. All that is gracious in His 
benignant ministry and glorious disclosures we can ap- 
propriate to our various and peculiar needs. For He is 
our Lord and the Shepherd of our souls. As we gather 
again on the return of this joyous festival to celebrate 
the advent of the wonderful child, what an appeal comes 
3 » 



50 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

to US from all that is most sacred in the annals of 
our experience, what associations group around this 
divine reality, what pictures rise on the memory that 
are hallowed by undying affections. Out of remote 
childhood troop the fair visions that made the early 
years radiant. From the hearth-sides of home come 
voices full of the tender music of infancy and parental 
affection and endearment. Old pleasures shed their 
perfumes that linger around places holy and fair to 
hearts that do not forget. We catch the glow that 
warmed the household atmospheres of years ago, when 
time had dealt less roughly with us ; and from the altars 
of the church, from the green garlands and balsamic 
boughs that symbolize the Christmas cheer, from the 
precious hymns and prayers of the sanctuary and its 
sweet communion, there come remembrances of joys 
that cannot die. And to-day there is the same bright- 
ness to Christmas as in the years long gone ; and though 
we miss the voices and smiles of some who were dear, and 
find a place vacant at the Christmas board, we know 
that in a better clime than this the beloved are waiting 
for us, where no tears dim their sight of the Redeemer. 
Dear friends, the closer we take Him to our hearts the 
keener shall be our enjoyment of our daily blessings and 
the brighter shall be the hope that shines beyond these 
scenes of change and trial. We cannot gather too much 
of the Christian spirit, — the spirit of forbearance and 
peace and sacrifice, the spirit of brotherhood and char- 
ity, the spirit of purity and devotion to Him through 



THE BABE LYING IN A MANGER. 



whom come all that makes the season precious and all 
that renders life noble and useful and true. The best 
mood that we catch to-day in our church and homes 
ought to be the prevailing one of our lives. I can wish 
you nothing better than such a union with Christ as 
that the mind that was in Him be ifound within you. 



^^And he said unto them^ How is it that ye sought me ? 
wist ye not that I 7nust be about my Father's busi- 
ness V^ — Luke ii. 49. 



V. 

THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. 

TT was the custom for Mary and Joseph once a year, 
at the feast of the Passover, to go up to Jerusalem 
to attend the religious services that were celebrated 
there ; and it appears that, when the child Jesus was 
twelve years old, they took Him with them, for the first 
time since His presentation in the temple while an 
infant. Nazareth was the residence of the holy family, 
and here, amid the charming loveliness of the place, the 
divine child was reared. I'he village reposed in the 
south-western corner of a beautiful valley enclosed by 
fifteen hills of gently rounded summits, one of which, 
rising several hundred feet above the town, commands 
a landscape of enchanting magnificence. " Westward, 
clearly defined against the blue waters of the Mediter- 
ranean, rises Mount Carmel. To the north gleams the 
white peak of Mount Hermon. Looking eastward, be- 
tween the bald top of Tabor and little Hermon, the eye 
rests on the fair valley of the Jordan and the highlands 
of Perea beyond ; while southward spreads the fertile 
and historic plain of Jezreel to the solemn mountains 
of Samaria and Gilboa.'' Nestling amid vineyards, 
fig-trees, and hedges of prickly pear, with its gardens 
and orchards and fruitful suburbs, the village possessed 



54 FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 

attractions which time has failed to destroy. The place 
was fair, indeed, but its brightest flower was the wonder- 
ful child. We cannot think of it without associating the 
babe and His tender years and unfolding loveliness with 
all that makes it interesting. The reverent desire has 
often been expressed for some glimpse into that home 
where the holy family dwelt in the beautiful seclusion of 
Nazareth. We can imagine the infant growing up there 
in the sacred companionship of His watchful and affec- 
tionate mother, who taught him to lisp His earliest words. 
We can imagine the child playing amid the olive orchards 
and vineyards of that flowery valley, and His artless and 
loving ways. We can imagine the youth gazing with 
delighted vision on the splendid landscape that spread 
around, and feeling the influence of those picturesque 
and historic scenes. We can imagine the young man, 
with His heart touched by the mystery of nature and the 
pathos of a sad humanity, looking with deep and solemn 
meditation upon life and the world, and still toiling on 
in the humble pursuit of a mechanic, and restraining His 
lofty soul to the performance of His daily task. Still, 
whatever we picture to ourselves, no description of those 
interesting years and experiences has been given us by 
the Evangelists, except the few words that tell of His 
human growth and development. His increase in stature 
and knowledge and in favor with God and man. Ac- 
cording to Jewish notions^ the age of twelve years marked 
the transition from the period of childhood to that of 
youth ; and this time was chosen by Mary and Joseph as 
suitable for Jesus to accompany them to the great festi- 



THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS, 55 

val at Jerusalem. They had, at the time to which our 
text refers, visited the city and participated in the relig- 
ious services of the occasion. There can be no doubt 
that the boy was -deeply affected by the sights of the 
holy place and the associations that would crowd upon 
Him. Coming fresh from the quiet of a village to tread 
the streets of the hallowed city ; standing in the temple 
with whose history He was familiar ; gazing upon the 
solemn services that signalized the passover, — with His 
keen susceptibilities and intelligence, what exquisite 
emotion must have thrilled Him, what visions of ancient 
glory and sacred manifestation passed before His mind, 
what thoughts deep and strange must have gathered in 
those affecting hours, and what new and mysterious 
impulses in this vivid sensibility must have stirred His 
nature to its depths. He was yet but a boy ; but think 
of Him with His freshness and purity. His eager inquisi- 
tiveness, His ardent receptivity, His reverent, awe in- 
spired, and affectionate soul wandering amid sacred 
Sion, calling to mind her wonders of old time, listening 
to the devotions of the populace, watching the tides of 
life that flowed through her ways, and contemplating the 
manifold objects that strike the youthful and unsophisti- 
cated observer. Doubtless the time of the sojourn of 
the family there seemed brief to Him in His absorption 
in the scenes and experiences of His visit. He was not 
ready, it seems, to return with the company, — probably 
did not heed the notice of preparation that was given 
Him, in the intense preoccupation of His mind, and so 
He lingered in the city while His parents and their 



56 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

friends departed. That was a caravan of considerable 
numbers with which Mary and Joseph travelled back to 
Nazareth ; and so, though it is likely they missed the 
youth more than once during the day, they probably 
supposed that He was somewhere with the company 
gratifying His innocent desire for novelty, and therefore 
felt no uneasiness about His safety. But at night He 
did not appear. The parents now cannot repress their 
concern. Going from group to group of the caravan 
made up of their kinsfolk and neighbors, expecting every 
moment to spy the beloved form, and so becoming more 
and more anxious as each family was approached and 
scrutinized, it finally dawned upon them that their child 
was lost. That was a moment of inexpressible anguish 
to the mother and her husband, when it was plain that 
further search amid their friends was vain. That they 
reproached themselves with their lack of carefulness, 
with their groundless confidence that all was well, with 
their neglect in setting out from the city without the 
positive knowledge that Jesus was with them, is evident 
enough to all who know the parental heart. We can 
understand, too, their misgivings as to His safety, their 
fears, their doubts respecting the manner of conducting 
the search. Had He strayed in some by-path on the 
road hither? Had He been inveigled into evil com- 
pany in the city ? Had He met with sudden and woful 
accident while wandering on the parapets of Jerusalem } 
Had cruel hands been laid upon Him, and the fair and 
tender head that had known so long the safety of a 
mother's arms been stained and disfigured ? Was He 



THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. 57 

Straying, home-sick and weary, in the awful soHtude of a 
great town, where there was no friend to pity and com- 
fort him ? Where would He get shelter as night came 
on ? Who would give Him bread in His hunger, or sym- 
pathy in His distress, if He had thus far escaped danger ? 
" They turned back seeking Him.'' Ah ! that was with a 
state of mind as different as possible from that with 
which they went up to Jerusalem a few days before. 
Then all was bright and joyous in the prospects of a 
pleasant journey. The fair boy, in the sweetness of new 
emotion and expectation, beguiled the way with pleasant 
talk, and every step brought nearer the pleasures of the 
festive commemoration. But now, carrying a heavy 
burden on their hearts, missing more and more the dear 
voice and the bright looks which shed such a charm 
upon life, full of self-reproach and a solicitude that has 
no language for its concern, they plodded on. It was 
natural that they should look for the youth in the city, 
for doubtless inquiries had convinced them that He had 
not been with the caravan at all in its homeward march ; 
and so there they sought, as only parents can seek, for 
the best treasure that they have. Those who, even for a 
few brief hours, have missed a dear child can appreciate 
something of the tearfulness and suspense of that search, 
how eagerly and tremblingly it was pursued in by- 
streets and shops and retired places, how it was con- 
tinued amid the attractive shows that would be apt to 
beguile the young, can imagine how those anxious eyes 
searched through suspicious places, how those hearts 
beat faster as they drew near groups of children at their 



58 FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 

play, and how in their disappointment they envied the 
gladness of parents in the company of their boys. So 
one day passed, and another, and still another. They 
had searched wherever it seemed most natural that such 
a child should stray. They had "gone on inquiring till 
doubtless they were faint from fatigue and solicitude. 
Certainly sleep and food could not be grateful in this 
time of suspense and grief. We can well imagine that 
the mother could not repress those old memories of the 
babe that was so wonderfully born ; they would come 
back, — all His beaut}^, the endearments of infancy, His 
sweet, pure life in Nazareth, her dreams of His prophetic 
career. So even in her bewilderment and anguish she 
must have had glimpses of a mother's hope. She could 
not give Him up ; and while nature v/as fainting from 
exhaustion there lingered supreme the great love that 
embosomed Him. It may have been the religious im- 
pulse that drew them to the temple ; for, had they 
thought Him there, they would have searched sooner in 
the place. No matter, they entered, and lo ! there was 
the boy, sitting in the midst of the doctors, hearing them 
and asking them questions. Think of the contrast 
between this impressive and touching scene and the 
picture that Mary had carried in her mind of her lost 
beloved son. No wonder that in. the rebound of her 
overtaxed sensibilities she cried out, " Son, why hast 
thou thus dealt with us ? Behold, thy father and I have 
sought thee sorrowing." Doubtless at the moment His 
reply seemed strange and harsh to her, with her heart 
running over with tenderness and vibrating yet with the 



THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. 59 

pulsations of an indescribable grief. " How is it that 
ye sought me ? wist ye not that I must be about my 
Father's 'business ? " This is the first recorded saying of 
Jesus, and it contains the evidence of His dawning con- 
sciousness of His sonship. The divine element of His 
nature was beginning to exhibit its presence. That He 
should have forgotten His seeming duty to the family 
for a little space is not wonderful when we consider the 
inner force that was driving Him forward in an eager- 
ness to grasp the questions of life, and in the intensity 
of an interest that no doubt had been stimulated by the 
scenes and services of the religious festival. The recog- 
nition of His Messiahship was not a sudden disclosure. 
He did not know as a child what He was conscious of 
as a man respecting His mission to the world. It must 
not be forgotten that His nature was purely human as 
well as divine. His humanity was positive and real, — 
not an illusive appearance, a phantasm. His body 
and mind were subject to the same laws of growth and 
development as our own. He was a babe, and knew 
the helplessness of infancy. He was a tender child, 
with the child's winsomeness, and innocent mirth, and 
trustful simplicity and guilelessness. He was a youth, 
with the kindling imagination, the vague and magnifi- 
cent desires, the restless spirit, the radiant hopes, the 
busy brain of the adolescent period. And he was, finally, 
a man, with the clear-cut character, the sturdy will, the 
teeming intelligence, the vast perceptions, affluent affec- 
tions, of the noblest manhood. But this development 
was according to the natural order of our human exist- 



6o FROM ADVENT TO LENT 

ence, — step by step and stage after stage cf insight, 
experience, knowledge. He doubtless learned His alpha- 
bet at His mother's knees. He listened wondering to 
the stories that beguile childhood. He felt the delight 
of the pastimes that please and amuse the young. The 
beauty and glory of the fair earth came to Him with the 
freshness and charm that it brings to all ingenuous 
souls. His mind unfolded apace with the passing 
years and the instructions of a loving tutelage. His 
character obtained a symmetry, and fulness, and posi- 
tiveness, and power, with the influences that wrought 
from without and within, and, as manhood, ripened to its 
maturity. All this, seen in its proper light and relations, 
is full of the sweetest significance to us in every stage 
of our existence ; for there is no period, from that of the 
tenderest infancy to burdened and afflicted years, that 
He has not experienced and with which He does not 
sympathize. " For verily he took not on Him the nature 
of angels, but He took on Him the seed of Abraham : 
wherefore in all things it behooved Him to be made like 
unto His brethren." Those who have not pondered 
deeply the great question of the incarnation may in- 
quire, " Why was the Lord so long on earth before engag- 
ing in His great work ? Why did He not come in some 
tremendous manner and at once accomplish His divine 
mission ? " On the other hand, those who appreciate 
the need of " a faithful high priest who is touched with 
the feeling of our infirmities," know well enough the 
infinite benevolence and love that go the whole length 
of our earthly road, the grace and power of that sym- 



THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. 6 1 

pathy that embraces helpless infancy and youth, as well 
as life in its darkest, most joyous, and most peculiar 
experience. Jesus is one of us, by a true birth into the 
human family, and by a participation in our being, 
through its various stages of happiness and trial. 

But alongside of this pure and unsullied and opulent 
humanity was the fact of the indwelling Word. For 
" the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, full of 
grace and truth.'' Exclude this supreme fact, and He 
was but an ordinary man. Accept it in its scriptural 
signification, and you have the key to His perfect char- 
acter, to His marvellous power, to His transcendent wis-< 
dom, to His infinite loveliness, to the grace and efficacy* 
of His sacrifice and resurrection. But the consciousness 
of this divine nature was not, as has been suggested, a 
sudden disclosure to Him. Its light and energy, work- 
ing with His unfolding humanity and inspiring and shap- 
ing that unfolding, did not reach the climax of revela- 
tion till the time of His inauguration at His baptism. 
Still the inward force of the indwelling Word did not 
cease to impel Him forward, to expand His faculties, to 
beget strange enlightenment, to shield from the taint of 
contamination, to exalt His apprehensions, to clothe Him 
with a sweetness and sublimity that w^ere entirely new to 
the race. Something of the divine impulse, the inexplica- 
ble consciousness of His relation to the invisible world, 
with the thirst of occult knowledge and the eagerness 
of a soul touched by the visitings of heavenly desires, 
and a sense, perhaps, of the awfulness of life, character- 
ized His experience at the hour when, to His mother's 



62 FROM ADVENT TO LENT. 

chiding question, He said, " Wist ye not that I must be 
about my Father's business ? '' The interests of His 
home-life there in Nazareth were for a time forgotten 
in the strong inflowing of sacred emotion and desire. 
The pastimes and engagements of childhood faded in the 
sweep of a larger horizon of thought and aspiration. 
The remembrance of paternal solicitude even was weak 
in the intensity of His awakened sensibility to divine 
realities. He was looking out on the infinite problems 
of our strange being with perplexed and yet not hope- 
less enthusiasm ; He was coming face to face with 
questions that underlie all that is serious and pathetic 
and awful in our being ; He was seeking the clew to 
the mystery of sin and suffering ; He was feeling 
already the personal responsibility attaching to His 
relations to the race, — and the impulse was stirring to 
do His Father's will. Of course, all of this was vague, so 
far as any plan or method was concerned ; but we can 
apprehend enough to see that His answer, " Wist ye not 
that I must be about my Father's business 1 " was not the 
utterance of an unfihal spirit, — was no childish protest 
against parental authority. It was prophetic of His 
great mission. It gave the hint of the wonderful nature 
that was ripening towards the fulfilment of all right- 
eousness. It afforded a glimpse of the agitation, the 
insight, the sympathy, the purpose of the character, on. 
which devolved such destinies to the race. He must, 
indeed, "be about His Father's business." This tempo- 
rary withdrawal from the protection and company of the 
family vv^as pardonable, on the ground of a higher alle- 



THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. 63 

giance and an experience inseparable from His nature 
and office. Seen in its true relations, it is entirely har- 
monious with the spirit of obedience which He always 
illustrated in the family, in the Jewish church, and in 
the State. His office was to "be about His Father's 
business." But mark, to discharge it He must go back 
to Nazareth. He must be subject to His parents. He 
must think and toil. He must take His share of the 
household burdens as the years bore Him to manhood. 
He must be content with His obscure life and humble 
place, though the evils of a wretched world cried for 
redress. He must endure for some eighteen years lon- 
ger sights of sorrow and wrong and wretchedness, with- 
out asserting the glad news of His Messiahship and 
grace. But still in this retirement, and amid His labors 
and fatigues and frequent loneliness, " He was about 
His Father's business." In that lowly home, where 
doubtless after the death of Joseph He contributed to 
the support of the household ; in the mechanics' shop, 
where according to tradition He wrought yokes and 
ploughs and such like implements of husbandry ; in the 
fragrant paths of the green and flowery valley, where He 
walked in the ardor of His fresh hope and aspiration ; 
on the hill-tops, where He looked down on spots sacred 
with historic glory, and where wonderful Nature shed 
from royal landscapes her s^veet influences upon His 
soul ; and in places consecrated to meditation and prayer, 
— He was doing His father's will. He was receiving the 
preparation for the perfect ministr}' that was before Him. 
Think not that during this space His heart did not burn 



64 FROM ADVENT TO LENT, 

with holy indignation at the arrogance of pride and 
injustice. Think not that He did not yearn over the 
prodigals that went astray. Think not that He shed 
no tears over sorrows that blighted hope and home ; 
that He saw not the foulness of sin and the black 
shame of human ingratitude and alienation, and com- 
prehended not the source and bitterness of man's woe. 
In the divine economy all this delay, this repression of 
impulse to go forth, this experience of poverty and toil, 
this education among the humble, and in self-mastery 
and self-knowledge, all that was peculiar to this period 
of His peasant life, was necessary to the full dev^elop- 
ment of His nature, that He might be a "faithful High 
Priest," and the "Saviour of sinners." His Father's 
business was served here, and we hear of no murmur at 
His condition. There is no record to show that He was 
any thing but submissive and patient and self-contained. 
In all this how much there is to instruct us, to encour- 
age our hearts in the postponement of anticipated 
achievement, and in hours when our work seems profit- 
less because lowly and unknown ! How much to rebuke 
the forwardness that rushes without preparation to life's 
solemn duties, and the impatience of souls with a ser- 
vice that is unostentatious and obscure ! He who ap- 
peared to reveal the perfect will of God, and to do it in 
the most sublimely momentous interests of the human 
race; who declared the principles of the universal relig- 
ion, and opened up the gates of everlasting life, — He was 
content to remain for thirty years in the cottage and 
workshop of Nazareth ere He went forth to be the bene- 



THE CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. 65 

factor and Saviour of the world. Let us not think that 
we cannot serve well if our tasks are humble and names 
unheralded before men. You are about your Heavenly 
Father's business if you are cultivating the spirit of 
Jesus, and using your talents and resources with an eye 
single to the divine glory. But ah ! if there is inten- 
tional neglect here, a waste of gifts and opportunity, a 
perversion of knowledge and a hardness to the divine 
love, then your sin remaineth, and its inevitable con- 
demnation. 



LENTEN DAYS. 



" The burden of the desert. ^^ 

Isaiah xxi. i. 



VI. 

THE BURDEN OF THE DESERT. 

A S the traveller pursues his journey, day after day, 
over the illimitable waste, he finally becomes con- 
scious of a weariness that is oppressive. Away, league 
upon league, stretches the vast expanse. The same sky 
is over him, the same dreary level before him, the same 
horizon bounds his vision at morning, noon, and night. 
No green hills or waving grain or refreshing groves 
greet his eye, nor does he hear the sounds of industry 
or amusement. Instead of pleasant valleys and culti- 
vated fields and the blue ridges of distant mountains, 
he sees on every side the mighty sweep of the desert, 
with its monotonous surface and ceaseless destitution 
of life with its activities and enjoyments. The inces- 
sant sameness, the path over such a wilderness, at last 
amounts to a burden. He longs for a change, if it be 
nothing more than a rugged road and sights and sounds 
that would be otherwise uninteresting. To think of 
travelling such a landscape for years would be intoler- 
able. He asks pleadingly, " When will it end ? " 

There are experiences of human life that are aptly 
figured by this "burden of the desert." In fact, all 
whose path runs on many years get into sad and lonely 



70 LENTEN DAYS, 



places that they would fain escape. The great major- 
ity of the human family are born to trial and care, — to 
a service that becomes monotonous in its continuity 
and demands. Where there is no severe trial in one's 
experience, there may be, from the constant pressure of 
daily duty, a burden that is at last distressing. I do 
not disparage the dignity and necessity of labor. It is 
one of man's greatest blessings that he is obliged to be 
industrious, frugal, painstaking, provident ; that he has 
to take responsibilities and endure hardship. No strong 
and noble character is formed without such an educa- 
tion. Still the fact remains, that where there is no relief 
to the vigilance that guards the interests of the house- 
hold ; where from year to year one is held down to 
continuous drudgery; where the struggle to maintain 
existence, with its urgent necessities, is protracted with- 
out respite, — the very sameness of the strain and solici- 
tude grows to be oppressive. There is a great multitude 
in the world who get no relief in their lives from the 
hard routine of their occupations and cares ; and though, 
of course, many of them are without high aspirations 
or fine sensibilities, yet among them are those who feel 
often that they are plodding over a desert. The dull 
and heavy monotony tires them. They are weary of 
the same path, the same service, the same changeless 
expanse, the same dark horizon. And looking out on 
the pictures that come frequently to their hearts, they 
ask for some pleasant change, — for a rest, perchance, 
on some musical shore, or amid mountains that are 
bright and sweet with health and peace. 



THE BURDEN OF THE DESERT. 71 

It is not SO much that any one place or any one oc- 
cupation is better than another, that a change in the 
fatiguing or dismal routine of life is desirable. One 
carries himself with him, of course, wherever he goes ; 
and the base and discontented mind can never, by any 
mere removals, wherever it wander, find nobleness and 
content. Still, the agreeable variation of one's experi- 
ence for a time is a recreation and a rest. It would be 
a blessed thing if all wdio know what the burden of the 
sameness and tiresomeness of business and household 
care is could have some little yearly respite, — some 
diversion from the heaviness and irksomeness of their 
way. Nothing is lost, but a great deal gained, when the 
desert-life is now and then broken up, and one is per- 
mitted to start afresh with a new experience. 

Another burden of the desert is a destitution of human 
sympathy. Such is the constitution of man that he re- 
quires society, friendship, affection. That life is only 
partially furnished that is without the enrichments ot 
love. It is in the sunshine of kindred natures, in the 
assurance of the trust and esteem and devotion of faith- 
ful hearts, that some of the most excellent traits are 
developed and the purest enjoyments known. Take 
away from one all pleasant companionship, all that tes- 
tifies to neighborly confidence and concern, and life is 
barren indeed. And yet there are those who live on 
without the consciousness of a sincere friend ; who, 
amid all the multitudes around them, are assured of 
none who have them in tender esteem. When one has 
thus carried alone his trials, has felt the heart-hunger 



72 LENTEN DAYS. 



that is never appeased, and appreciates the value and 
possibilities of friendship, his isolation and poverty 
amount to suffering. He bears the burden of the 
desert. We may believe that a good many know what 
this is, — what it is to walk a wearisome path with no 
trustful companion ; to abide where there is no home ; 
to come from work with no welcome of watchful eyes ; 
to go abroad with none to express interest or solici- 
tude ; to endure disappointment, pain, sickness, without 
enjoying the support of affectionate assiduities ; to feel 
day after day that they are cared for by none in all the 
world. With such life not only grows monotonous, but 
cheerless. There is no verdure upon it. It is unblest 
with fountains of sweet waters. 

But there is another desert over which the most, whose 
lives are protracted, have to travel, at least for a time, 
and this is the desert of afifliction. Manifold are human 
woes, and strange and grievous the paths in which some 
are compelled to walk. It is true that some seem fa- 
vored with peculiar blessings, and enjoy a freedom from 
the calamities that blight the roses of so many lives. 
And yet no one can feel assured, while in the world, 
that he is secure from affliction. For, of all certainties, 
human prosperity is uncertain. Many a man at a time 
when he expected to look upon a joyous household finds 
it overshadowed, and a great vacancy where he promised 
himself a sweet companionship. Many a one goes 
groping about, bowed down and weary, where the light 
of hope once fell full of gladness. Think of the 
mothers who bury their babes, and receive no more 



THE BURDEN OF THE DESERT. . 73 

to their caresses ; the maidens who trusted to false 
vows, and who carry the secret of their deception in 
broken hearts ; the long widowhoods, where toil and 
poverty are daily guests ; the maimed and decrepit who 
were once -strong, but now are cut off from all the high 
activities and generous rivalries of the living ; the unso- 
phisticated and affectionate, who have been bereft of 
their guides and counsellors : think of all those who 
watch hopelessly by painful couches ; who come back 
to roofs where no kind voice welcomes them ; who toil 
on amid the throng without sympathy ; who bear in their 
innocence dark suspicions ; who feel each day the bright 
illusion of health or competence or affection elude them : 
think of those whose wrongs are not righted, of those 
whose tears are never wiped away, of those who rest not 
in their anxieties and griefs ; the great, sad, motley cara- 
van of the tried and the disconsolate the world over, — 
and you will confess that a vast number know the 
"burden of the desert/' Onward they travel, and yet 
they seem to be no nigher the longed-for place of re- 
freshment. The birds do not sing for them, nor the 
brooks prattle, nor the cool mountains rise, nor the 
fruitful vales welcome them to pleasant retreats. It is 
on and on, with the burden pressing heavy, and with 
feet sore and weary, that they go. 

But there is yet a more dreadful burden of the desert. 
To be destitute of the desirable things of this life is bad 
enough, but to have hopeless desolation in the soul is 
infinitely worse. 

There are those believing in a righteous God, w^io 
4 



74 LENTEN DAYS, 



acknowledge their guiltiness to themselves, and who yet 
bear it unforgiven, — souls that have, perchance, sinned 
grievously against the light and prostituted their gifts, 
and who still would fain be thought unsullied. And 
there are souls whose fatal leprosy is disclosed to their 
burning disgrace. All such carry a load that is tor- 
menting. Their hearts are parched. The sweets of 
life are turned to bitterness. Oh ! this disgust at self, 
this shrinking before infinite purity, this sense of loss 
and dishonor, this shame that can turn nowhere for 
concealment, this terrible isolation where one sees what 
he has abused and how awfully he is dethroned, — this 
is the desert in which the soul is stranded through trans- 
gression. 

There are still other aspects and experiences of man- 
kind that are figured by the text. From some natures 
the light of the eternal world seems almost or quite 
excluded. There has come upon them terrible doubt, 
— perchance the springs of belief are dry. They look 
up to no benignant face, infinite in pity and love. They 
hear no voices singing of the infinite wisdom that is in 
all things. No spirit of unutterable goodness seems 
pervading the universe, and touching their hearts with 
a blessed joy. The wonder and the beauty of the world 
IS not asserting to them the ineffable glory which shines 
in the uncreated and the eternal. Some of these have 
not purposely discarded the gospel, — have not willingly 
welcomed the dark doubts that make their night. They 
have not preferred this spiritual vacancy and desolation. 
And yet they have to come to it. There are others 



THE BURDEN OF THE DESERT, 75 

whose sins and wickedness have drawn them in. But, 
whatever the near or remote cause, there are experiences 
in many a man of a waste that is bleak and dreadful 
and despairing. 

I know that with the most who are living without God 
the pleasures and pursuits of the present occupy their 
thoughts. They are quite absorbed in what pertains to 
sense and time. Their chief concern seems to be to 
gain the world. And yet there are those with no relig- 
ious hope, who never cease to ponder the deep and 
inscrutable mysteries of being, and who go bowed 
beneath the load of despondency which their skepticism 
imposes upon them. They see life as under a sky of 
brass. Dark fate has fixed oblivion but a little way 
ahead to their hopeless eyes. To them the earth with 
its inhabitants is but a faint mote in the infinite expanse 
of the soulless universe. The boundlessness, the mys- 
tery, and the a\vfulness of things weigh upon them. 
They tire of the oppressive sense of their uncertainty, 
of their insignificance, their dark doom. They have no 
faith for prayer. They have no joy in the recognition 
of love perfect and almighty. 

And there are myriads more who, wandering far from 
God, never succeed in hushing the cry of the soul for 
rest and home. They know that their desires outrun all 
earthly achievement. They know that they have capac- 
ities for divine friendship, for uses that are pure and 
holy and heavenly. They know that, unguided and 
alone, they cannot and do not find the perfect good. 



76 LENTEN DAYS. 



They know that the insatiate soul Ufts itself above all 
these visible shows, and pleads for blessed and ever- 
lasting possession^. Ah ! is it only a desert way that 
our sad humanity is to travel, and must it hunger and 
thirst in vain ? Is there nothing better and more en- 
during for the great multitude who toil and suffer than 
what they find in their short journey on earth ? Our 
answer is the blessed gospel. It is the voice and cross 
and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is the experience, 
too, of those who know Him by His indwelling life. 
Beyond the desert is the glorious land. There the ever- 
lasting mountains stand ; there the perennial fountains 
flow ; there the vales, beautiful and flower-enamelled, are 
embosomed. O poor humanity ! with your long stages 
of labor and pain, with your tedious marches and moon- 
less nights, with your thirst for happiness and your 
fading hopes, with all your v/oes and burials, how can 
ye bear it all without the blessed hope of what is beyond ? 
Thank God it is true that the landscapes of morning 
and light and contentment are there, where the redeemed 
and purified shall be welcomed at last. And the assur- 
ance of this is one of the great supports and inspirations 
of those who learn sadly that this is not their continu- 
ing city. 

As one on the Western plains nears the great range 
of the Rocky Mountains, towards evening he is some- 
times permitted to look upon a scene of amazing im- 
pressiveness. The peaks are lifted up like towers of 
God's glory in the silent sky. On the mighty shoulders 



THE BURDEN OF THE DESERT. 77 

of the mountains rest draperies of rose and purple, 
while their colossal breasts seem to brace the energies 
of a world. Over between the distant ridges are lumi- 
nous mists, golden like star-dust, and palpitating and 
gleaming like the ethereal vesture of angels. The sky 
glows beyond, opal and pale green, with the fringing 
clouds of saffron and scarlet, and more remote, white 
as the winter snow. You seem to look into depths of 
celestial magnificence. The mountains themselves are 
the symbols of everlasting strength ; but you seem to see 
in them delicious resting-places, — a glorious seclusion, 
where the streams run sparkling, and the birds sing, and 
the light falls without blight or dazzling ray. You 
seem to hear their tones lulling and grateful with sug- 
gestions of rest and plenty and contentment. Tliere 
seems security there amid the gigantic palisades, and 
inspiration in the fresh and unpolluted air, and gladness 
in the miracle of beauty that is ever unfolding, and 
which is ever new. It is so to the vision of the believer, 
weary with the burden of the desert of life, as full of 
faith, and in the leadership of the Master, he journeys 
on and nears the blessed world. The darker and more 
trying this life has been, the better does he appreciate 
the one that is revealed to him in the gospel of the 
Son of God ; and the more perfectly the life of love is 
manifested within him, the clearer and more inspiring 
shall be his apprehension of that higher state in which 
his being shall have perfect fruition. For it is with the 
spiritual eye that he looks on spiritual things. If his 



78 LENTEN DAYS. 



heart is pure, if he is transformed into the Hkeness of 
his Lord, he shall behold unutterable glories, which 
shall be his. For "eye has not seen nor ear heard, 
neither have entered into the heart of man, the things 
which God hath prepared for them that love Him ; but 
God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit, for the 
Spirit searcheth all things ; yea, the deep things of God/' 
These " things," you observe, are not learned by human 
wisdom, but by the soul, which, through its renewal in 
holiness, is prepared for them. That knowledge is in 
Christ the Lord. If any ever trod a desert way, or bore 
its burden, it was this divine Redeemer ; and yet He saw 
and knew the wondrous blessedness of His Father's 
house, that "imperial palace whence He came." 

So, though the disciple have here an experience of 
the desert, it is his privilege to enjoy the companionship 
and sympathy of Him who passed through it all, and 
who will give sweet wells of Baca even in the lonely 
and arid places, and who leads on to the land whose 
sunshine is the smile of God. Therefore, weary pilgrim, 
be cheered and consoled. Your way is not altogether 
barren. Many and many an oasis you reach and enjoy 
in your heavenward journey. Many a rest you have 
where you would like to tarry, for the Lord is near. 
But even when you feel most oppressed and forsaken, 
with Faith's strong eye you can look forward. Out of 
the gloom rise the fair trees that grow beside the water 
of life. The peerless mountains of the heavenly Zion 
lift their fadeless summits in airs that have no taint of 



THE BURDEN OF THE DESERT. 79 

death. You discern the valleys of rest afar, whose 
fruits never decay, and where the loved who have gone 
before you abide. But, best of all, the good Shepherd 
there lead3 His flock where they suffer hunger and thirst 
no more, and where, pure like Him, they are glad for 
ever. 



^ Bury me with my father s.^^ 

Genesis Ixix. 29. 



VII. 

LOVE IN DEATH. 

nPHERE is a wonderful naturalness in the delinea- 
tions which the Bible gives us of our human char- 
acteristics, and, as we read what is said of those whose 
lives are portrayed on its sacred pages, we recognize 
continually the fidelity of the descriptions. Nothing is 
more marked in our humanity than the family relation, 
and some of the most touching and beautiful tran- 
scripts of it, in all history, are found in the Scriptures. 
Take the story of Joseph, with which you are all so 
familiar, and all through it are incidents and features 
which illustrate the household interests, the domes- 
tic feelings and sentiments, which were as sincere 
and tender then, in the infancy of the world, as now. 
The fact of this simple naturalness in the portrayal 
of what is human in the Bible is one of the evi- 
dences of its genuineness, and one reason of the 
powerful hold that it has upon the hearts of all genera- 
tions. The sorrow of Jacob has a parallel .in all pater- 
nal hearts that mourn over the loss of a beloved son. 
His reluctance to allow Benjamin to be separated from 
him, his clinging to the old associations of the house- 
hold as age came upon him, his joy in the discovery of 
his long absent Joseph, his benedictions of his children, 

4* F 



82 LENTEN DAYS. 



and his wishes and arrangements about his burial, — all 
speak of the deep instincts and ineradicable feelings 
that are characteristic of the race, and which appear all 
along in the experience of those who live to see their 
children grow up around them. The ties of family are 
the strongest that we know. Such is the gracious ordi- 
nation of Heaven, that those who are near of kin are 
bound together by deep and sacred affections. They 
live in each others' lives. They participate in what is 
best and noblest in each others' characters and com- 
panionships. The love of each other is one of the 
sources of their choicest happiness. It comes so in 
these relations that the mind instinctively associates 
with the beloved name whatever is most precious in this 
life, and whatever seems attractive and blessed in the 
life to come. For, where these home relations have been 
continued through a long period, there have ii^evitably 
been born, in joy and in sorrow, in labor and trial, in 
mutual cares and mutual successes, a series of experi- 
ences that have the deepest significance of all that the 
heart can know. There come a community of thought 
in the effort for the advancement and adornment of 
life, an appreciation of character in its more hidden 
sources and depth, a sense of the value of affectionate 
companionship and support, a knowledge of the rich 
and inviolable treasures which accumulate in mutual 
helpfulness, and the growth of the soul in sweetness 
and strength ; a habit of trusting and consulting and 
communing together, which tends to bring lives into 
more profound unity, and lead them to think of the 



LOVE IN DEATH. Zt, 

future as quite desolate, if these relations should cease. 
The children that grow up in the household only deepen 
these attachments. All the service that is done for the 
preservation and the comfort and the welfare of those 
who are gathered at the board, is a means of strength- 
ening and purifying these affections. The very pains 
that are endured in ministering to the weak, in provid- 
ing for the helpless, in all the exigencies of poverty and 
sickness and misfortune, are instrumental in exalting 
the sense of the preciousness of those who are thus 
dependent upon us. As persons in middle life or ad- 
vancing age, who have children growing up around them, 
look back to the days of their infancy and youth, they 
appreciate, as never before, the value of parental tender- 
ness and care. Their parents seem clothed with a 
greater sacredness. They understand better than they 
did a mother's love, a father's solicitude, the sacrifices, 
the constancy of watchful assiduity, of those who guarded 
and taught them under the roof of home. With their 
experience of parental care and tenderness and affec- 
tion they feel more deeply identified with those who 
gave them birth, and their gratitude and reverence are 
proportionally increased. Life is therefore strongly 
fastened backward in holy bonds, as well as projected 
forward in the hopes and affections that abide with the 
children of the household. The parent carries on with 
him not only the associations that are growing and 
strengthening daily in the circle about him, but the 
retrospection of a long past, when he was the subject of 
tender care, and an incalculating friendship. And so, 



84 LENTEN DAYS, 



among the bright looks and cheerful voices of the young 
that are near him, he sees in memory the revered heads, 
the benignant faces that long ago bent over him, and 
hears the voices of wisdom and endearment that spoke 
in the years that are gone. However ardently he fore- 
casts the future in the interests of -the young, he feels 
bound very closely to an ancestry whose virtues he 
prizes more as he is more conscious of the solicitudes 
and responsibilities of his own position and influence. 
And as time goes on, and family history is made, in the 
changes and joys and sorrows of home, the heart in- 
stinctively cherishes whatever has been most dear and 
valuable in experience. Jacob could not disassociate 
his love for Joseph from that of the mother of the boy, 
and he clung more fondly to Benjamin because his 
brother had vanished and Rachel was no more. In 
almost every family it happens that something is made 
to seem more sacred because it was prized and esteemed 
by a dear one who has gone, — one on whom are cen- 
tred a peculiar interest and affection, through some 
reason that the heart only can explain. There gets to 
be a profound feeling of identification with the object 
loved, so that life seems broken and imperfect without 
it. This taking into one's self the grief or affliction of 
another has illustration in those who came to the 
Saviour, asking for Him to have mercy on them, when 
they sought a cure for a dear child. And that gracious 
Redeemer never sent one such away unblest. He 
showed all through His divine ministry how sacredly 
He regarded these family relations. Born into a human 



LOVE IN DEATH. 85 

family Himself, He knew all that pertains to helpless 
infancy and hopeful and wondering youth. Whatever 
was holy and precious in home He learned in a real 
experience, and His life there with Mary and Joseph 
is invested with a heavenly charm. He wrought His 
first wonderful work at a marriage, consecrating these 
domestic ties with His presence. Mothers brought 
their children to Him, and with His benediction life 
seemed gladdened to eyes that saw the evils in the 
world. It was some home that He was continually 
illuminating by His sympathetic presence, by His heal- 
ing touch, by His consoling words, by a love that made 
life cheerful and brave. What evidence could be 
stronger of His appreciation of what is in a human 
heart than when He gave the widow of Nain her son, 
when He rejoiced the Syrophenician woman with the 
cure of her daughter, when He sent the word of life to 
the officer at Capernaum, and when He brought Laza- 
rus back to the desolate home in Bethany. Almost His 
last word ere He died in agony was to His mother. 
So, if any thing is clear in the gospel, it is certain that 
the family ties are holy, and the instincts of the true 
heart, with reference to kindred, approved of Heaven. 

And it is natural to desire a continuation of these 
relationships. The patriarch Jacob in his last request 
says, " Bury me with my fathers ; '* and this feeling has 
illustration all along the ages in different races and 
climes. What is it but the outward symbol of that 
which is deepest in the heart ? What is it but an ex- 
pression of the preciousness of these earthly relation- 



86 LENTEN DAYS, 



ships ? Bury me with my fathers. Of, course in the 
grave, with silence and darkness, there is no device or 
knowledge. So far as the perishing bodies" are con- 
cerned, it cannot matter essentially whsre they repose 
when the spirit has fled. And yet they are the tene- 
ments of thought and will. They are associated with 
all that is most expressive in our being. With them 
are grouped the activities, the endearments, the acquire- 
ments, the possessions that make up our estimate of 
life. When the patriarch said, "Bury me with my 
fathers," he thought of those whom he revered and 
loved, whose remains were lying in the sepulchre of 
Machpelah; he thought of the holy friendships that 
had consecrated and sweetened his years, — and those 
forms of parent and wife and kindred seemed endued 
with life and feeling in the strong ardor of his soul. 
He wished to continue the relationship, and would sleep 
with those from whom he descended and loved. How 
natural is this sentiment, and how largely is the custom 
observed throughout the world. Wlien we think of 
death and our place of burial, it is with thoughts of 
others who have gone before us. A lonely grave, a 
burial away from friends and kindred, — remote, unvis- 
ited, neglected, — brings sad thoughts. We cannot help 
shrinking from the picture that we make of it. To die 
alone, to be buried by strangers, to lie afar from any 
dust that once was dear, is not what we would prefer. 
But there, where our ancestors repose, where parents are 
entombed, where sleep the companion of our journey, 
or child^ or sister^ or brother, or beloved friend, — there^ 



LOVE IN DEATH, 87 

too, we would be borne by tender hands, when we can 
tell none how kind they are. It is the same feeling that 
prefers those who love us to minister to us in our last 
hours, and perform the last offices that friendship can 
render. The human cries out of the darkness of death 
for the beloved presence, the heart that was true and 
kind. And if we can feel that when we are gone there 
will be any to follow us with sorrow to the grave, and 
there to plant some symbol of affection, and, as the days 
and years pass, to go aside sometimes and think of us 
as we were, with our friendship and faith, there comes a 
grateful emotion. There is something sweetly tranquil- 
lizing in the thought that we shall lie down with the 
family around us, the revered and good who closed their 
eyes long ago, and those who follow us out of the doors 
where we followed others who have gone ; and that they 
shall bring the children one by one to sleep by our 
side. All this is grateful to our thought, I say; and 
why t What could it mean if the heart did not reach 
onward to everlasting attachments, to life with the 
beloved beyond the grave ? And oh, how dark would it 
be, when we come to face the dread necessity of death, 
were it not for the light that comes from the broken 
sepulchre of Christ ! What would be our hope without 
this victorious and mighty Saviour, who has put death 
under his feet ? Dear friends, here is an assurance, glo- 
rious and indubitable, that is given for everlasting com- 
fort and strength. He who consecrated home while 
on earth, with all that could sanctify and sweeten it, 
prepares the heavenly home. He it is who shows the 



SS LENTEN DAYS. 



precious brotherhood of our humanity ; how that all the 
peoples and nations of the earth are one family in Him ; 
that all are united as the children of our Father who is 
in heaven, and redeemed by His well-beloved Son. 
Oh the largeness of the divine grace, the preciousness 
of the divine disclosures 1 We soon pass away. Our 
friends are passing on. The old family circle is more 
and more broken up. The dearest associations are 
sundered. We know very well that after a little the 
great world will go on, and we have no voice in all its 
affairs. And as we think of the graves that are green 
over so many that were dear, we say, " Bury me with my 
fathers,'' and bring others that must follow after a while, 
to rest by my side. And yet our thoughts and our hearts 
go forward still to a rest where there is no weariness, 
and to a home that no cloud of sorrow shall ever darken. 
We want the light that never goes out, — the joy that is 
full in our Father's house. But without Christ and His 
victory what would be our hope t Ah, this blessed and 
mighty One has not only suffered for us, but overcome 
the grave. In His face is the radiance of immortality. 
He has opened wide the gates to the city where there is 
the need of no sun to shine into it, for the glory of God 
doth lighten it for ever. And yet none but the pure in 
heart may enter in. Washed in His righteousness, all 
are clean. Quickened and renewed in His love, life is 
lifted upward and enriched, and fitted for the felicities 
of the household of God. Oh what hope, what strong 
assurance, may we have through Him who is the first- 
born from the dead, the living, loving, victorious Lord. 



LOVE IN DEATH. 89 



We do not go down to the dark valley as if it were the 
end. " The grave is the inn of the disciple on his way to 
the New Jerusalem/' as said the great and good Dean 
Alford. His sleep is an awakening to peace and glory 
unutterable. For all the beloved in the Lord wull Jesus 
bring with Him, — the little ones who just gave us their 
smile and vanished, and the earthly parent on whom we 
leaned so long, and the dear companion whose absence 
left a long, long sorrow, — all who saw in the holy Jesus 
their friend and brother, and loved to look to Him as 
better than all. Oh, to-day let us come gladly to cele- 
brate the love of this Redeemer and conqueror ! Surely 
if there is a sweet light on our lives, it comes from 
Him ; and if there is a hope better than all others, He 
gives it ; and if there is due a thanksgiving that should 
take our hearts and our all upward in adoring gratitude, 
and a spirit of tender and holy consecration, it is to Him 
who taught us and washed us, and bids us follow Him 
here in love, that we may live with Him when all that 
is earthly and changing has passed away. 



^^ I am not alone^ because the Father is with me^ 

John xvi. 32. 



VIII. 

LONELINESS. 

npHESE words were uttered by our Lord towards the 
close of His earthly ministry, having in view the 
desertion that He should suffer, and His loneliness in 
the day of trial. Though human sympathy was pre- 
cious to Him, and though doubtless it was with a sharp 
pang that He marked the conduct of His disciples when 
He was apprehended and borne to the judgment seat, 
still, in the profoundest sense. He was not alone. The 
Father was with Him. His resources were divine ; and, 
being a perfect son. He had the consciousness of the 
paternal love of the everlasting God, and in Him He was 
mighty to suffer and to conquer in our cause. 

Those who are knit to Christ, and in His spirit are 
leading His life, m'ay appropriately use these words as 
expressive of their own experience. 

Periods of loneliness are not at all uncommon, so far 
as our earthly life is concerned, and it must always be 
so in this world. Friends like to look upon each other^s 
faces, to enjoy the sunshine of each other's society. 
There is a refreshment in the glow that warms the heart 
in the interchange of interesting thought, in the dis- 
covery of congenial sympathies, in the looks and voices 
of those whose companionship is dear. The burden of 



92 LENTEN DAYS. 



life is lightened by household intimacies and the delights 
that are born in sincere affection. So when, by travel 
or removal, one is cast a.mong strangers, or wanders far 
from home in a strange land, it is natural that he should 
feel the effect of absence, — that he should recur fondly 
to the familiar scenes that lie behind him. And the 
more interesting the sights that welcome his gaze abroad, 
the more attractive the life that he finds in his journey- 
ings or his studies, the more will he be apt to long for 
the presence of those who can appreciate his enjoyments 
and respond to the ardor of his emotions. It is into a 
friendly ear, into a receptive heart, that he would pour 
the expressions of his satisfaction at the sight of historic 
scenes, of unique and magnificent art, and of serene and 
affluent nature. He misses the appreciative eye, the 
ardent soul, the religious mood, the exalted understand- 
ing, of the friend who is far from him, but who would, if 
present, enter so deeply into the frame of his richest and 
deepest experience. 

But this loneliness becomes more poignant when 
death has taken away those who are dear. While the 
loved are living, there is an amount of companion- 
ship, though their paths, for a space, may be widely 
apart. Though as you roam over the distant prairie, 
or sail the seas, or climb the hills of the Orient, you ex- 
perience involuntarily a sense of loneliness, you still 
have the society of pleasant thoughts and memories, that 
are more precious the longer the interval of your absence. 
The consciousness that some are thinking of you with 
tender interest, that every day some mention your name 



LONELINESS. 93 



in their prayers, that hearts are counting the weeks till 
you retiirn, — all this mitigates the pain of separation. 
Then, too, as you cherish the precious images of their 
worth ; as you say to yourself, " How this which is so in- 
teresting to me would give them joy ; " and as the antici- 
pation of a reunion again is sweet, — you get some savor 
of their society, some comfort of heart. But, when death 
bears away your treasure, when the dust covers the form 
that shed such a cheer upon your path, you cannot feel 
the glow of hope that made your steps quicken towards 
home ; nor does memory speak with such inspiration to 
the soul. That the vanished friend may not be far 
away you may fondly believe ; it may be a solace to you 
to think that the departed are still permitted, as pure 
spirits, to note your career, and to sympathize with your 
experience, still you know that there can be no more 
actual meetings in time. Home must still be destitute 
of their voices and their smiles. The vacant place 
cannot be filled. The gentle heart, so true and tender 
and strong, is not there to give you rest and peace. 
You look forward, but the way seems long ; and beyond, 
but oh, how thick the veil ! You are alone, and in that 
loneliness you picture what once made your days so 
bright and the earth so beauteous, tiU, in the vision, you 
realize a deeper, sadder solitude. Times come when 
the consciousness of your bereavement is intensified, 
when you wonder why any can be gay, and when things 
once so real seem thin and spectral in your gaze. " Oh 
for the touch of a vanished hand and the sound of a 
voice that is still ! " you say to yourself, longing so much 



94 LENTEN DAYS. 



for the old companionship, and having so much to utter 
that ahnost breaks your heart, and appreciating so 
thoroughly the rounded fulness of a life that the lost 
love might have made so rich. Ah, how many know 
well what this loneliness is who were once strong in 
the friendship of the pure and good ! How many, in 
spite of their honored names, their affluence of posses- 
sion, and their sumptuous homes, bow down often in a 
sense of solitude that is distressing ! 

But it is not mere separation from the living, it is not 
merely the bereavements of death, that make loneliness 
for man. There is a solitude with some amid the dens- 
est throng, there is a wall of partition betw^een some 
who breathe the same air and stand in the midst of the 
same scenes. Where the man's experience is beyond 
that of his fellows, where from the elevation and scope 
of his thought and aims there are none with whom he 
has communion, he is alone. He may, indeed, partici- 
pate in society, and seem to others like themselves, but 
still he is further removed than if mountains rose be- 
tween them. For it is the mind that makes company. 
There can be no society where hearts do not feel some 
kindred thrill, where in aspiration and endeavor there is 
no sympathy binding soul to soul as it gazes into life. 
The great thinkers, the pioneers of humanity in the 
higher fields of investigation and pursuit, are always 
lonely. On the side of your nature that is developed 
more largely than your neighbor you are least under- 
stood. In purposes that keep you farthest from the 
vulgar and sensual you have little of their sympathy. 



LONELINESS, 95 



Take your deepest experience, when the visible and all 
the glories of it seemed melting away and shrivelling up, 
and when life in its pith and kernel was most awful to 
you, and few can appreciate your mood. And so some 
find themselves in a solitude amid scenes of hilarious 
festivity, and go unaccompanied, though a thousand 
walk their earthly way. A certain bond of humanity, it 
is true, holds all in its embrace ; but natures must have 
a community of spiritual apprehension, of aim, of inter- 
est, to come into helpful alliance. 

And this is seen clearer in the objects that are the 
supreme purpose of all great and singular souls to pro- 
mote. Let a man be caught up in an intense conscious- 
ness of the value of truth yet unrecognized by the world, 
let him be spurred with a commanding passion to 
achieve a vast good for the race, let him see clearly the 
necessity of an enterprise that, if accomplished, shall 
shower its benedictions rich and sure upon the living, 
and at the same time get no recognition for his philan- 
thropy, and have no support for his sacrificing fidelity, 
and he shall know what it is to be alone. Such were 
the prophets of humanity, who were scoffed at by their 
generation ; the sages, who were assailed as the enemies 
of the Lord j the martyrs of religion and science, who 
lived far in advance of their age, but who were faithful 
to the light that was in them, and were willing to suffer 
if truth could be victorious. Surely there were lonely 
hours for Socrates and Galileo and Columbus and 
(Ersted and Franklin, Watt and Stevenson and Fulton 
and Morse, and for many a student of the mysteries of 



96 



LENTEN DAYS. 



nature and the universe. Surely the path was often 
lonely to souls like Paul and Chrysostom and Berenga- 
rius and Huss and Wickliff and Luther, and the long 
line of illustrious saints and disciples in ages of dark- 
ness and persecution and confusion. It is hard enough 
to pursue a high and holy enterprise without encourage- 
ment ; it is grievous enough to labor on in obscurity and 
poverty and sickness and bereavement, for the sake of 
truth which few or none accept ; but to do this, as many 
have done it, in the midst of opprobrium and injury, yea, 
at the risk of life, to meet with hostility in striving to 
secure a sure good for those who treat their benefactors 
as enemies, — this is leaving one to a solitude in which 
only the strongest and most heroic natures can endure. 
Such see that they are shut out from the sympathy 
of the multitude, who live on as if they were the fools of 
phantasy. And so life is lonely in the high places of 
their thought and the low places of their humiliation ; 
lonely in the meditations that absorb their thought and 
the energies that they apply to their undertakings ; 
lonely in their devotion to their purpose and in the depth 
of their disappointments and trials. 

But I need not describe further these times of human 
loneliness. They are manifold and singular ; and each, 
as he rises to lofty endeavor, or is smitten strangely and 
sorely, gets the clew to their meaning and their distress. 
But if his spiritual life be true and sincere, though so 
far as earthy concerns go he is alone, he is not alone 
in the sense of a divine friendship and inspiration. Our 
Lord trod our earthy road. He was one of us in all 



LONELINESS, 97 



that is peculiar to our humanity, save sin ; and, deeper 
than our experience fathoms, and higher than it as- 
cends, extended the majestic volume of His own. For 
who was ever alone in the world, if it were not Christ, 
the Man of Sorrows ? Wherever was there a nature so 
little appreciated and understood ? Where did one ever 
enter into depths of life's august meanings like Him ? 
Who ever assumed such a mission and consecrated him- 
self to such a work as that which broudit the Lord of 
Glory to the cross? Where has one ever stood so near 
men and yet so far away, been so darkly suspected 
and so cruelly treated, while discharging the sublime 
ministry that should disclose God and lift a race to the 
brightness of His divinity ? Our darkest woes, our most 
singular trials, our sense of remoteness from the confi- 
dence and affection of men, can merely give us the clew 
to that solitude which He knew in the burden and pain 
of His ministry of reconciliation. And yet though those 
who had been His most intimate companions deserted 
Him, when the dark hour of His passion and apprehen- 
sion came on, and though there was not a single earthy 
friend to give Him company during that terrible night 
of anguish. He could say, " I am not alone, for the Father 
is with me." His soul rested on the Infinite. He was 
sure of the love of Him whose best name is Love. He 
had in His deepest consciousness the support and 
sympathy of the everlasting God and Father: there 
was compensation ; there was comfort ; there was life ; 
there was victory ; there was the eternal joy. And so 
m a significant sense it may be with us. The blessings 
5 G 



98 LENTEN DAYS. 



of home and friendship are by no means to be depre- 
ciated. It is a blessed thing to have the enjoyments of 
affection and the sympathies of those Avho are around 
us. Do not think, however, whatever your lot, however 
adverse your condition, that there is no heart beating 
tune with your own, no eye that marks your fidelity, 
and no compensation that shall reward your obedience 
and devotion to the truth. It was hard to buiy that 
beautiful child, to give up that well-tried companion of 
your happiest days, to stand in places deserted now by 
friends that were loveliest and by intimacies that were 
holiest. It is hard to dwell apart with no precious com- 
panionship, to long for the society that shall supply the 
deep, human need, and to feel capable of friendships, 
high and pure and strong, that are never made. It is 
hard to labor on in a noble cause without the encour- 
agement of those who shall reap from your toils and 
denials, and to carry the deep consciousness that what 
is best and truest in you is not known nor admired. It 
is hard to be put apart from sweet intercourse by pov- 
erty, and the obscurity of your name, or mistaken preju- 
dices ; hard to bear all that you have to bear in your 
separations and bereavements and labors and pains : 
but if you are knit to Christ, and a joint heir with Him 
in the inheritance of light, you are not alone. There 
are blessed presences in your solitude ; there are holy 
and beloved voices in the silence of your retirement. 
An unseen hand is over you, a light shines on your 
darkness. There is a heart infinite with its love that 
beats in sympathy with your deepest life. There is a' 



LONELINESS. 99 

spirit working in you, refining, chastening, uplifting, 
educating, comforting, inspiring hope, patience, trust, 
faith, the ardor of holy desire and the peace of a sure 
victory, whose mysterious operation you may but little 
understand, but which is the paternal grace and the 
paternal benediction. 

You are too apt to forget, amid the pressure of life's 
burdens, the whirl and confusion of the world, that the 
divine love is personal, individual, discriminating, un- 
changing, and that through ways that we know not the 
Lord is leading us on. When you seem most nearly 
deserted. He may be drawing you nearer to Himself. 
When, in pain and weariness and disappointment, you 
may feel most alone. He may be preparing you for more 
w^onderful disclosures of His love, for more gracious 
apprehensions of Himself. Your times are in His hand. 
The Good Shepherd knows His sheep. There is no 
father, no friend, no brother, so pitiful and compas- 
sionate as He who calls you His child. Whatever else 
may fail, be sure that His everlasting love will not fail. 
He is with you in your struggle against sin ; in your 
search for truth ; your toils, and griefs, and loneliness, 
and trials. All your hope, all your patience, all your 
aspiration, all your regard for what is excellent and im- 
perishable, comes from Him. And as He has given you 
your capacity for His friendship and His likeness. He 
will train you and guide you to Himself, if you are sub- 
missive and obedient. " Behold what manner of love the 
Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called 
the sons of God ! '' And to discover that love, behold the 



LENTEN DAYS. 



Lamb of God. Ah ! without God in Christ, without the 
sympathy and grace and inspiration and life of the 
Eternal One and the Just, what shall we do, and where 
shall we go, and what shall be the end of this existence 
that is given us ? Picture to yourself an ocean, bound- 
less, endless, alone ; from whose billowy wastes rises no 
shore, in whose measureless expanse is no isle of beauty 
and calm, and over which the cloud-rack hangs sullen, 
dreary, and portentous. See there a frail raft bearing a 
single form. Onward it floats over the wrinkled sea. 
The winds come swift and chill over the dark waters, 
and it floats on ; and the waves, growling and hissing, toss 
it like a bubble, and it floats on ; and the clouds gather, 
and bend scowling and angry and bleak over it, and it 
floats on : onward under the brazen noon, where it is 
swung on the great swells of tide, and onward in the spec- 
tral twilight, when the waters seem like writhing serpents, 
and onward under canopies lit by no cheer of stars : 
onward and onward, into the depth of the unknown, 
into banks of gloom written all over with despair, into 
abysses of the distance where there is no end, — floats 
on those few planks that single soul. Is he not lonely 
there ? Is that not solitude, with no friendly face into 
which to gaze, with no human voice to break the awful 
monotony, with no gleam of woodland or cape to wake 
the hope of rescue, with no sweet odor of a fair shore to 
salute his sense, and no glimmer of a beacon to tell of 
home ? Is that not lonelmess^ left to float, and float, and 
float, without guide or compass, without a friend or 
hope, — on and on into the desolate waste, and the aw- 



LONELINESS. loi 



ful spaces of silence and darkness and despair? But 
oh, what is this to represent the soul that is without 
God, utterly isolated in the bereavement that takes the 
infinite Father away ; journeying into the eternities 
alone, living on without the Father's smile and the 
Father's care and the Father's love ; wandering, and 
lost, and abandoned in the infinite terror of its loneli- 
ness and woe 1 



" Always bea7'ing ahoict in the bo^y the dying of the Lord 
yesus, that the life also of Jesics might be made 77ia7ii- 
f est in our body, ^'^ ' — 2 Corinthians iv. 10, 



IX. 

DYING WITH CHRIST. 

T\7HAT a contradiction this must seem to the unspir- 
itual, — dying for the sake of living, making tribu- 
lation the way to peace, going to crucifixion that we may 
rise to glory, bearing about as common things, losses, 
pains, sorrows, in the consciousness that good is coming, 
and sure blessedness, and everlasting gain ! Yet this is 
the eternal law. All growth is through decay. All gain 
through loss. All glory through humiliation. All life 
through death. The rocks crumble away to make the 
soil. Vegetation decays and enriches the earth. Fruits 
and grain perish in supporting the animal creation. 
And higher still, childhood dies into youth, and youth 
into manhood. Fancies and dreams are supplanted by 
realities. Deliberate action succeeds random impulse. 
Through the painful throes of labor come vigor and 
learning and wealth. And so life ever mounts up on 
the dissolution of what is lower through all the cycles 
of universal nature. 

And the highest expression of this law is in Christ 
and the Christ-like life. It is in Him that is prefigured 
what is profoundly true in the experience of every soul 
that is true to Him. And the characteristic feature of 



I04 LENTEN DAYS, 



it all is dying to live, — surrendering something that 
something more precious may be secured, accepting the 
cross that we may wear the crown. In a word, the 
whole truth of godliness is summed up in sacrifice. 
And Jesus is its perfect embodiment and illustration. 
He becomes poor that we may be made rich ; does the 
work of a servant that we may have the inheritance of 
sons ; goes to an ignominious death that we may rise 
to a sovereignty of good and everlasting joy. Compre- 
hending His gospel, we see that it is literally by giving 
Himself away that He draws to Himself the hearts of 
men. It is love — supreme, unalterable, exquisite love 
— that makes Him victorious. By humiliations, sus- 
picions, affronts, sufferings, death, His real life was not 
suppressed, but rather it royally asserted itself and 
blossomed out in glorious fulness and surpassing power. 

Dying with Jesus in the body is bearing the distresses, 
pains, crosses, that come in the life conformed to him. 
It is through the body that we are first made conscious 
of existence. This is the medium of all sensation, the 
wonderful instrument of the mind, the vase that holds 
the immortal soul. Through this flows into man the 
solemn beauty of the universe, through this he comes 
into fellowship with kindred natures, and is linked with 
the world of mastery and mystery around him. 

But bodily infirmities, this dying of the body, does 
not necessarily impair the spiritual life ; but may, through 
the divine compensations, enrich it. For who has not 
seen the loveliest characters among those who are the 
feeblest and most afflicted .'' Who has not seen some, 



DYING WITH CHRIST. 1 05 

from whom are shut the sights and sounds of the fair 
earth and loving friends, the most patient and con- 
tented and grateful of the living? Who has not marked 
the holy resignation of life-long sufferers, the wonderful 
sweetness of delicate hwalids, the abounding faith of 
some who have lost every thing except the joy of their 
Lord? As in a forest where the storm once tore its 
way, is seen, years after, the rarest beauty in the vines 
and branches that have been twisted and interlaced in 
glorious festoons, and in flowers whose seed was sown 
by the wings of the remorseless wind ^ so here, in these 
stricken ones, grace appears sometimes in fruits of sur- 
passing loveliness. The soul has conquered the body. 
Pain has purified. In physical weakness life has 
reached out into divine sunshine, and grown strong and 
brave and beautiful in its hold upon the cross. And 
how many humble roofs, how many lowly couches, lit 
up by few sympathetic faces, may we believe can testify 
to this ! The sufferer is knit to Jesus, and His life is 
manifested within him. Dying with Him, there has 
come the life of the higher nature. The spiritual man 
has been clothed upon while the outer man has decayed. 
The soul is fed from the everlasting life. 

Again, this dying with Jesus is realized in a partici- 
pation wdth Him in sacrifices for His sake. The life of 
the Lord was a perpetual sacrifice, — a dying for man 
that the divine life might be restored. So the life of 
Jesus in the disciple is one of tender sympathy, hope- 
ful, generous, loving ; one that suffers long and is kind ; 
one that ministers graciously and denies itself, and ac- 
5* 



Io6 LENTEN DAYS. 



counts it honor enough and praise enough if it can do 
the lowliest service for those who need. Yes, whatever 
may be said of the selfishness of men, and this is dis- 
couraging enough, there are some who have learned 
deeply what this dying is, and who, instead of lament- 
ing that they are called to a hard service, rejoice that 
they are permitted to take a cross that the Master bore. 
These feel in themselves the anguish of a world groaning 
and travailing in tribulation ; they forget their owm 
sorrows in their eager effort to help and comfort 
those more tried than they. It is glory enough for them 
to bring cheer to a single home and a single bleeding 
heart. They work on, though amid suspicions and 
blame, believing that the Lord's kingdom is ever com- 
ing, that now they are members of it, and that sin and 
wrong shall be put under foot and destroyed. And so 
His life of patience and sympathy thus ripens in them. 
They grow strong in His strength and in His affections. 
Living for others, they apprehend more fully the god- 
like life. 

And the same principle is seen in all the discipline, 
however sad it may be, of the disciple. Looked on from 
without, the state of some is pitiable indeed. Now that 
labor has been unremunerative, now that friends have 
changed or are gone, now that home is robbed of its 
jewel and health is broken, and foes rise up in the way, 
what is there, one is tempted to ask, that is worth living 
for.? Is it not better never to have been born ? Ah! 
life is coming in this death : the patient spirit, the pure 
heart, the celestial vision, the holy temper, the large 



DYING WITH CHRIST, 1 07 

charity, the peace that antedates the everlasting rest, — 
graces that the Holy Spirit nurtures in the faithful soul. 
This comfort was taken away, but thus the heart was 
flung more utterly on the Lord. Wronged and maligned, 
the disciple has learned how blessed it is to forgive. 
Dying unto sin, carrying in his own experience heart- 
ache, neglect, and poverty, he has found the deep mean- 
ing of the cross and the hiding of its power. And so, 
if you would find characters that shine with the brightest 
lustre, look not where all' is most outwardly prosperous 
in their condition, not among the luxurious and flattered 
and pampered ; but in homes shadowed by great trials, 
in lives that have trod the winepress of suffering. That 
one may seem to you as bereft of all that is desirable ; 
but no ! there is hope like an anchor to the soul, a 
love that has grown deep and rich in heavenly friendship, 
patience, meekness, and purity, and constancy that the 
bleak air of the world cannot kill. This is what makes 
man noble aijd valuable. The base and earthy must be 
purged out of him. He must take hold of the life of 
God. What he lives for is to do the Master's work, to 
come to His likeness. All that obstructs his spiritual 
growth, all that shuts out the divine light or blights the 
spirit of love, must die away. The real dying of Jesus 
was His renunciation of all that could impair the per- 
fection of that ministry of reconciliation which was con- 
summated on the cross. Here is the pattern for the 
disciple. He comes into it more and more by the yearn- 
izigs of prayer, by the upward reach of faith, by the cm- 



Io8 LENTEN DAYS. 



cifixion of self, by the sympathies that take up the griefs 
of men and make life a blessing to hungry and troubled 
souls. And oh ! this life of Jesus ; this lowly, submis- 
sive, rejoicing life ; this blessed rest in His love ; this 
sight of His perfection, more ravishing as sin is purged 
away ; this tender, precious communion with Him who 
gives us His own refreshing life ; this hiding in the cleft 
of the Rock of Ages, secure and satisfied for evermore, — 
this compensates for all earthly losses and decays. So 
in the deepest death with Him there is the intensest 
and most blissful life. In sacrificing all things sinful, 
for His sake, the man is clothed with His righteousness, 
which is a garment of perpetual praise. He counts all 
things here but loss for the excellency of the divine 
knowledge. In the evolution of such a character, in 
the prospect of such a weight of glory, dying is liv- 
ing. The resurrection is already begun. Christ is all 
in all. 

While we prize, as we ought, all temporal blessings 
as good gifts from God, let us not feel that they are es- 
sential to our highest life. As certain herbs being 
bruised give their choicest fragrance, as precious gums 
exude from the wounded tree, so out of buffetings and 
trials are born the heavenly graces. We do not begin 
to see the glory of the Christian life until we learn the 
power there is in sacrifice. There is nothing really 
contradictory in this dying and living unto Jesus, in 
the sorrow and the joy of the^believer. But all the secret 
mystery of this, the triumph and contentment of love, 



DYING WITH CHRIST. 1 09 

we cannot know until we come into the secret of God. 
This daily crucifixion, this daily renewal into higher 
and holier life, this is the lesson which we have to learn 
for ourselves. We do not attain heaven by careless and 
indolent steps. It is through struggle, perchance pain 
of some sort. But this is only one side ; the other is 
holiness, joy, victory. 

Remember, whatever your experience of hardships 
here, that our Father has promised more than you ask 
or think ; that He who is for you is more than all who 
are against you. " For," says the Apostle, " I am per- 
suaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor prin- 
cipalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to 
come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall 
be able to separate us from the love of God which is 
in Christ Jesus our Lord." 

" The seed must die before the corn appears 
Out of the ground, in blade and fruitful ears. 
Low have the ears before the sickle lain, 
Ere thou can'st treasure up the golden grain ; 
The grain is crushed before the bread is made, 
And the bread broke ere life to man conveyed. 
Oh, be content to die, to be laid low. 
And to be crushed, and to be broken so, 
If thou upon God's table mayest be bread, 
Life-giving food, for souls an hungered." 



EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 



^* Now in the place where he was crucified^ there was a 
garden ; and in the garde?! a new sepulchre^ wherein 
was never 7nan yet laid. There laid they yestis^ — 
John xix. 41, 42. 



X. 

THE SEPULCHRE IN THE GARDEN. 

0^0 it was in view of a pleasant scene that Jesus died, 
and in the midst of a garden that He was laid. It 
is always thus on earth that dark and bright realities 
stand in contrast. Life and death confront each other. 
There is a sepulchre in every garden. How aptly does 
this faithful touch of the Evangelist illustrate all that is 
sincere in human experience ! Taking the fact described 
here in its deep suggestiveness, let us read in its typical 
illumination a chapter of life that is common to us all. 

And, first, I observe that each man has a garden. It 
may not be that where the outward sense is regaled 
with fruits and flowers and odorous airs, — not that, 
but a sacred enclosure of the heart. No life, indeed, is 
without its bright spot, — hidden away, perchance, among 
sad memories, yet reverently cherished. As on bleak 
hill-sides of splintered rock green things nestle, and a 
flower here and there springs up, so in human experi- 
ence there is something still bright wdiere exist poverty 
and corroding care. None have been without their 
dream of a good to come. Some fair hope has glided 
into the heart. Some true and tender feeling once had 
place, and is not wholly forgotten, even if the man has 
wandered far in sin. There is yet the odor of a past 

H 



114 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

delight in days that have gone under the cloud. Years 
ago the roses and lilies were planted ; and many a pleas- 
ant blossom has unfolded since, though watered often 
with tears. Very beautiful are some of these gardens, 
with dear friendships, with the engaging interests of 
home, with noble plans for self-culture and benevolence ; 
very beautiful with generous trusts, and holy endear- 
ments, and the music and sunshine of dreams. All 
have their garden ; but, guard it and prize it as they 
may, it shall be the scene of tragedy. It contains a 
sepulchre. 

The generous and aspiring youth seems, indeed, to 
stand on the border of -a land that will never lose its 
morning freshness. As yet no disappointment has 
dampened his ardor. His pulse throbs with enthusiastic 
resolve. In thought he walks amid unfading bowers, 
and sees the grapes of joy ripen for his hand. But this 
radiant landscape contains a tomb. He does not see it, 
attracted by so much that enamours his gaze ; but it is 
there, a new tomb, and it shall not be vacant long. 
For, as the years pass on bearing him to manhood, does 
the garden seem as redolent of life as it did ? The 
rude feet of care have trampled down many a blossom, 
and decay has touched something that once seemed very 
fair. Aye, there apart, doubtless, is the grave of what 
seemed too lovely to be buried, — glorious hopes, feel- 
ings that once warmed into being many a grand design, 
and aspirations that withered in the hot glare of an un- 
sympathizing world. Who shall tell how much is cof- 
fined there ? Behind the stone that is rolled against the 



THE SEPULCHRE IN THE GARDEN, 115 

door, who of you, my friends, does not know that some- 
thing precious lies cold and still? 

But, as regards the experience of practical life, where 
is the garden without a grave ? It is not merely the 
man who has fallen from a prosperous fortune to ob- 
scurity and penury that has a sepulchre over which to 
mourn. There are tombs in the garden of the rich, the 
gifted, and the great. Baffled purposes, alienated friend- 
ships, exhausted energy, the corpse of many a brave 
endeavor, the lost inspiration of eager manhood when 
the path to victorious life seemed garlanded with light, 
— all this, and more, speaks of death. And so in the 
great w^orld of action everywhere men feel, as the years 
vanish, that something dear has passed to the burial. 
With all their success, they are conscious of painful 
change and decay. They have not gained all that they 
sought. They are not what they expected, and perhaps 
strove, to be. Shrouded now in darkness and silence 
are the images of a happier or a better life. They have 
a sense of absence, which the sight of all their posses- 
sions and honors cannot relieve. And how often does 
the gloom of the sepulchre shadow the fair treasures 
that they have gathered around them ! In all the ardors 
of life they are confronted with the dread solemnities of 
death. 

But sadder still is the tomb in the garden of the affec- 
tions. If any thing on earth is sacred, it is home, with 
its hallowed privacy, its joyous intimacies, its endearing 
and pure attachments. This is not the place to look 
for gloom. Yet the sepulchre is here ; and it will 



Il6 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE, 

not be empty long. Though no dark omen for the 
present overshadow it, still sad change finally comes. 
There is a vacant place by the hearthstone. A smile 
has passed away, and voices that gladdened the soul. 
That home may be pleasant still, and the casual visitor, 
in the sight of its delights, may not think that it contains 
a place of burial. Yet, though the spot is sealed, it is 
not forgotten. To be sure, the great world goes on as 
before the sorrow came. Hands are busy, and the brain 
active, and the heart holds closer its remaining treas- 
ures. There is carefulness in the household, and life 
takes hold perhaps earnestly of temporal interests, and 
so the garden of home may seem to bloom again ; yet 
over against it stands the sepulchre. Bereaved hearts 
know it is there ; and oh, how they linger at times around 
it, how they return to it when none know the burden of 
their memories ! Face to face with all human prosperity, 
with all the throbbing pulsations of life, is the place and 
reality of death. That lone man, who in the fierce 
struggle of existence has, to the observer's eye, become 
indurated to feeling and sentiment, could doubtless lead 
you to a green mound that is still moistened with his 
tears. The cypress shades many a scene that seems to 
some all sunshine. Time has borne away the freshness 
and buoyancy of life. There is grief over the living 
lost, — the wayward and erring ones that filial tender- 
ness could not melt, nor gracious tutelage restrain. In 
the garden is the sepulchre. If you are full of youthful 
enthusiasm, it is there. If you are struggling for a true 
and strong and useful life, it is there. It is there if you 



THE SEPULCHRE IN THE GARDEN, 117 

are dowered with opulence and power. And it is well 
that it should be so ; well that we learn our frailty, 
our ignorance, our sin ; well that we be disciplined 
and educated, according to God's methods, for our eter- 
nal home. For with man's sinful nature and tendencies 
how fearful might be his career in transgression, and 
how reckless his presumption upon the forbearance of 
God, did he never suffer from the evil within and with- 
out him ! Now, on every hand, he is taught his insuffi- 
ciency as he stands alone. He finds that he has a 
nature that cannot be satisfied with visible possessions, 
and that his life is meaningless and incoherent if inter- 
preted by this state of being alone. Ever in his baffled 
efforts and his physical weakness, in the greatness of 
his plans and the smallness of his achievement, he is 
reminded of a sphere of being where the hindrances to 
his happiness and holiness shall be removed. So, read- 
ing his sad experiences by the light of the ever-blessed 
gospel, he knows they are wise teachers for his guidance 
here, and prophets of the glory that awaits the obedi- 
ent and believing. And oh ! if in the faith of Jesus he 
is following on, through the Spirit of all Truth, to the 
deeper knowledge of his fellowship and love nothing 
that is precious now in the grave shall be lost. 

It is the power of this conquering Saviour over death 
and the grave that makes our Easter joy so pure 
and full. Upon the sublime truth of His resurrection 
depends our everlasting welfare ; round this stupendous 
reality revolve all the permanent and exalted interests 
of life. In the garden was a new sepulchre : there laid 



Il8 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

they Jesus. But this Jesus has God raised from the 
dead, whereof, says St. Peter, we are witnesses. Maiy 
saw Him as she turned away weeping from the empty 
tomb. The hearts of the two disciples who journeyed 
to Emmaus burned within them as He talked with them 
by the way. More than once to the astonished apostles 
He appeared, wdth words of authority and love. Thomas 
thrust his hand into the spear-mark in His side, and 
with his fingers felt where the cruel nails had pierced 
His hands. He ate with His friends of fish and honey 
on the seashore. Five hundred brethren saw Him at 
once, and recognized their Lord. And, after the gra- 
cious ministries of forty days in Galilee, He disappeared 
from their sight. All the ancient prophecies respecting 
His sufferings and death were fulfilled. The work of 
His humiliation and mercy was accomplished. The 
grave could not hold Him. Dying, behold, He lived. 
The demonstration of the divine good-will was complete. 
Ar expiring Saviour, a risen Lord ; a suffering Servant, 
a King of Glory leading captivity captive ; a victim of 
the world's evil, a Redeemer from all transgressions ; 
cold and silent in the grave, and in the might of His 
divine nature pushing back the bolts of death and van- 
quishing the King of Terrors ; bearing in His innocence 
the burden of a sinful race, and opening the gates of 
everlasting life to the redeemed who come to Zion, — • 
henceforth it was " Jesus and the resurrection " that 
made the gospel a power on the earth. The dark wall 
that seemed to enclose this brief existence was broken 
down. Life meant something glorious in the light of 



THE SEPULCHRE IN THE GARDEN. 119 

the cross and the empty sepulchre. Though its burden 
was heavy and its paths rough, it could bear a divine 
interpretation. After all, man might be saved in body 
and soul. He was not born to perish like the brute, 
with all His aspirations and loves. So apprehending, 
through the spirit of Jesus, the Life that was given for 
him, he feels that the resurrection which is begun within 
him is the pledge of the glorious one to come. For that 
sense of blessed possibilities in the thrilled and exult- 
ant soul, that peace which deepens in sweet communion 
with the Lord, that hold of the heart on spiritual reality 
which has about it no odor of the grave, — the ardors, the 
hopes, the affections which are born in the embraces of 
a conquering and undoubted faith, — these tell not pf 
death, but of life, — pure, joyous, winged life. And so 
what is written in the Scripture of the fruitions of the 
sanctified is corroborated in the experience of the soul 
that is more and more transformed into the likeness of 
Christ the Lord. There is already the foretaste of 
immortality. 

So, my friends, the grave in the garden, to such a 
one, is not a place of everlasting stillness and decay. 
The stone shall be rolled away. If you have died unto 
sin, and are buried with Christ in His death, you shall 
rejoice in the final resurrection of all that can contribute 
to the bliss -of the soul in the eternal kingdom. You 
know now how hard it is to wait in the loneliness of a 
bereavement that casts such a shadow on your path. 
But patience can have its perfect work as you look for- 
ward to the reunions of the blest. To think of the per- 



I20 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

petual peace that shall there abide, the divine security 
which nothing evil can invade, the circle there that shall 
never be broken, the light on the face of Infinite Love 
that shall never go out, the rest and beatitude of that 
unmolested home where all that is dear is gathered 
safe in the arms of God, — to even think of this now is 
like a strong inspiration to lift us above the world. Yes, 
there shall be no death there: Jesus has conquered 
death, and in the great resurrection those who are His 
while in the flesh will Jesus bring with Him. No mat- 
ter where they slept, or what the changes that have 
passed on the mortal part that was dissolved, they shall 
put on their glorified bodies, and enter the habitations 
prepared for them from the foundation of the world. 
There no tomb shall be closed. There hearts shall 
never ache for those who return no more. There none 
shall bear the cross of secret trial. No evil tongue and 
no cruel hand can be there. There shall be no cr}ung, 
nor any more pain ; no guile of the Tempter to seduce, 
and no sinful nature with which to contend. Jesus shall 
lead them to the still waters of His perfect peace. From 
His face shall shine the light in which shall blossom all 
their bliss. Sweeter shall be their joy as they rise to 
clearer apprehensions of His beauty, and are drawn 
into the intimacies of a more transporting fellowship. 
If now you are His by a spiritual resurrection to the 
knowledge of His love, what may you not anticipate in 
the abounding blessedness of your immortality ? 

But how dark is your prospect if you do not believe 
upon His name, nor love His appearing ! The sepulchre 



THE SEPULCHRE IN THE GARDEN, 121 

in the garden of your life is then the symbol of the death 
which awakens to no celestial fruition. Out of Christ, 
you lose all that can make your immortality glorious. 
The day of the full liberation of the blest from the 
thraldom of the grave shall be the day of your wretched 
doom. Oh, day of sorrowfulest sorrow to the wicked, — 
day of triumphant joy to the sanctified ! The grave 
cannot hold them. Their garden no longer contains a 
sepulchre. Death himself is swallowed up in victor}^ 
The immortal shores are gained. We see Jesus as He 
is. Only a little longer, faithful heart, have you to wait : 
a few more nights of trial ; a few more graves closed in 
the garden ; a little more watching by the tomb ; the 
cross borne a little further; a few more drops tasted 
from the cup of the Lord's sorrow ; heart and hope 
drawn a little more closely to Him, — and then the unfet- 
tered life, the resplendent glory, the full joy of seeing 
Him face to face who redeemed you and loves you, and 
of abiding with Him for ever. " He which testifieth 
these things saith. Surely I come quickly : Amen. Even 
so, come, Lord Jesus." 



" There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual hody.^^ 
*' We shall all he changed^ — i Cor. xv. 41, 42. 



XL 

THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 

TT is a conscious and happy existence after the death 
of the body of which we desire the strongest certi- 
tude. The subject of the resurrection has no signifi- 
cance, no interest to us, except as identified with 
continued and exalted fife. If there can be no future 
being without the carnal resurrection, — I mean a lit- 
eral, physical, atomic resurrection of the body that dies, 
— then, rather than give up our belief in immortality, 
we will accept that^ for the belief in immortality is not 
to be abandoned. But if such a reality of future exist- 
ence is promised as meets the needs and wants of the 
soul without a carnal resurrection, then what is the ad- 
vantage of it t Why should it be so strenuously msisted 
on by any who accept the gospel ? In this matter we 
must take the divine word, and not what Is advocated 
by fanciful or mistaken theologians. There is no sub- 
ject of our holy faith that has been treated in a more 
repulsive, irrational, and unscriptural way than that of 
the resurrection of the dead. Statements have been 
made about it not only in conflict with all that is known 
of the word and methods of God, but at which the best 
spiritual instincts revolt. The whole analogy of Script- 
ure, the requirements of science, and the demands of 



124 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE, 



the religious nature, are satisfied in the glorious view 
enunciated by St. Paul. 

Those who insist that the resurrection means the 
restoration of gross matter, are always getting back to 
the idea of flesh and blood. But this the Apostle ex- 
plicitly denies : " Flesh and blood cannot inherit the 
kingdom of God." Now the identical body which is 
laid in the grave, atom for atom, shall be perfectly 
restored, or it shall not. If restored, then the body 
must be exactly as it was at the moment of death. If 
glorious and immortal existence is secured to the Chris- 
tian, under new conditions suited to the nature and needs 
of the soul, then what perishes by death will not be 
wanted. And this is what the gospel assures us, and 
what we cry for in our sins and sorrows. 

We are to accept the truth that our nature is consti- 
tuted for the sphere of being in which it is placed, and 
its uses there. What is the fact of our present state ? 
We have an immaterial intelligence and a material body, 
— "a terrestrial body," and its *' glory is one." It is 
good, and wonderful, and fitted for its present condition 
and service. No better vehicle for the soul, here in 
the realm of physical things, can be conceived than a 
healthy, human body. Yet it wears out and dies. Wliat 
is the fact of the eternal state ? We shall have an im- 
material soul, and a "spiritual body," — a "celestial 
body," whose " glory is another." " As we have borne 
the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of 
the heavenly." Because this mortal body is precisely 
w^hat is w^anted for our present existence, it is no evi- 



THE SPIRITUAL BODY, 



dence that it is what is adapted to the glorified and 
eternal state. Indeed, unless that state is to be a con- 
dition just like this one, where being will be repeated 
under exactly the same circumstances, we can have no 
possible use for such a body : it would be a hindrance 
and clog. That such a carnal resurrection as is taught 
by some is incredible, I shall not argue at length ; yet 
a glance at a few facts may not be inappropriate. 

In the first place, the body is constantly changing by 
virtue of the process of nutrition, and we wake every 
morning with a body differing from the one with which 
we went to sleep. The man who lives to the age of 
seventy years has had his body renewed at least ten 
times during this period. Now, which of these bodies, 
or what part of each, shall he have in his resurrection, 
if the identical atoms once in his mortal frame, amount- 
ing to ten times the matter of one, were gathered up for 
an immortal body? Suppose he takes what is his body 
at the moment of his dissolution, then he must eternally 
have what was characteristic of it at that time. If we 
hold to the atomic theory, we must be consistent, rigo- 
rously so, or we give up the principle. So, if the man 
dies, terribly maimed, or loathsomely diseased, or ema- 
ciated to a skeleton, or blistered and charred by fire, — 
whatever his appearance, — he must be so for ever, par- 
ticle for particle, in exact juxtaposition, quality, and 
quantity. If it is a material restoration, it rnust be 
accurate, if it be at all. 

But, perhaps it is answered, God will give what was 
peculiar to the best condition and aspect of the body, — 



126 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE, 

to the most perfect health. Will He ? What then ? 
Some never know what it is to be well ; their lives are 
protracted amid suffering. Some are hideously de- 
formed, monstrosities, hateful to themselves, and ob- 
jects of pity from their entrance into the world. Would 
these like to wear their ugliness for ever.^ Ask those 
who limp with painful steps through life ; ask those 
whose years are blighted by incurable disease ; ask the 
crippled, the bed-ridden, the palsied, the deaf, and 
dumb, and blind, and insane, — if they could under- 
stand the question, — if there is any period of their 
lives when they would wish to have the body that they 
wore their eternal tabernacle, — if they do not long for 
what is fair and comely, and superior to all evil change ? 
How could the promise be true that " all tears shall be 
wiped away," that " there shall be no more curse," if 
the identical bodies, with identical disease and de- 
formity clinging to them, were restored? No won- 
der that St. Paul greatly wished to put off this fleshly 
vesture, and prayed that mortality might be swallowed 
up of life. It was not this '' flesh and blood " that he 
desired to be clothed with, but " the house from heaven," 
— the spiritual body. 

But, further still. Change is the great law of nature. 
There is no absolute annihilation, but the same con- 
stituents of things serve in their turn many purposes, 
and in different combinations work benign and gracious 
ends. The human bodies that decay only vanish to 
reappear in other forms in the grand economy of the 
universe. They mingle with the elements. They live 



THE SPIRITUAL BODY, 1 27 

in the ocean of the atmosphere. They circulate in the 
sap of the tree. They swell in the bud. They tint the 
flower. They enrich the pulp of the grain. They be- 
come ingredients of animal life, and still pass and flow 
on according to the divine ordination. And so it comes, 
in the great procession of life, that what has been a 
portion of the body of one has had a place in many. It 
has served for thousands, perhaps millions, of years, but 
in the end it has a definite locality. Now, as an atom 
or any aggregation of atoms can be in one place only 
at the same time, whose will the material be in the 
general restoration, if each body claims the exact con- 
stituents which belonged to it in time ? For perhaps 
hundreds had once the same atoms in their mortal 
frames. When one can tell how twenty suits can per- 
fectly furnish a hundred men, then he can answer this 
question, and explain how a part of a thing is equal to 
the whole. 

These suggestions, instead of discrediting the resur- 
rection as St. Paul asserts it, only support and illustrate 
it. To appeal, as some do, to the power of God as the 
last resort in the maintenance of an atomic restoration 
of our physical bodies, seems both presumptuous and 
illogical. The question is not about \ki% po7ver of God, 
— though He can never contradict himself, — but the 
will of God. He has power to do what He does not 
and will not perform. He could make harvests ripen 
without our planting and tilling. He could replenish 
the mines of iron and gold that have been exhausted. 
He could make our city beautiful with structures more 



128 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

superb than human hands can raise. He could trans- 
late us so that we should not see death. In innumer- 
able ways He could do what He never will do. For 
He works in harmony with His perfect nature accord- 
ing to the laws that are inherent in Himself. 

Now, just what the religious nature craves is assured 
in the resurrection of the just. We want to exist, and 
this is certified. As in Adam we die, so in Christ we 
shall be made alive. But what is that in which resides 
the consciousness of life ? It is not the body, nor emo- 
tion, nor thought. Says Griffith: "That which I call 
myself is not a mere congeries of thoughts, but some- 
thing which has these thoughts, to which they present 
themselves, in which they converge, and from which 
they emerge. I mark myself as one and indivisible in 
contradistinction from the world, from the body, and 
from mind, the object of consciousness." Butler sa3-s : 
" Our gross organized bodies are no more a part of our- 
selves than any other organized matter around us.'* 
Plato, in closing an argument on this point, affirms : 
"The man being neither the body by itself, nor any 
compound of body and soul, must either be nothing at 
all, or else that one thing in which mastery resides," 
meaning the soul. Professor Rollinston declares : " A 
man is one thing, his mind another, his body a third. 
Although they both belong to him, they are no more the 
man himself than his horse or his dog." The Scriptures 
corroborate all this. The body is likened to a scab- 
bard, — "I was grieved in my spirit in the midst of its 
sheath ; " to an earthly domicile, — "we dwell in houses 



THE SPIRITUAL BODY, 



129 



of clay ; " to a tent, — " our earthly house of this taber- 
nacle ; " to clothing which shall be exchanged for a 
better garment, — '^ desiring to be clothed upon with 
our house which is from heaven." So mind is distin- 
guished from the man. " What man knoweth the things 
of a man save the spirit of a man which is in him/' that 
is, himself. " With the mind I myself serve the law of 
God/' All the phenomena of consciousness, as much 
as the world without us and the body around us, are 
affections, movements, manifestations of the simple 
self, but are not themselves that self. The continu- 
ance of selfhood is what makes our existence. 

But we want a life that shall so serve its purpose as to 
fulfil the end of its creation, and this is assured in the 
resurrection of the just. The Ego, the I, with all that 
pertains to the soul, needs organs for its use and ser- 
vice. And a body is promised, — a body we need and 
desire, which shall be as perfectly adapted to the soul 
and its sphere, as is the present body to this condition. 
But this present body is the "terrestrial," the "mortal " 
one. It has its office and its honor ; but its glory is 
peculiar to its use in this world. The glory of the 
" celestial " is another. Its texture, its capabilities, its 
sphere will be different from this. " For we shall be 
changed." " This corruptible must put on incorruption, 
and this mortal must put on immortality." There can 
be no such assumption of the spiritual and the unde- 
caying without the putting away of that which is mate- 
rial and decaying. We shall bear the image of the 
heavenly. 

6* I 



130 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

But do you ask, How, then, is the identity of the in- 
dividual preserved? The answer has been already sug- 
gested. The identity of a person does not depend 
simply upon the amount and position of a certain num- 
ber of material particles. Change is constantly going 
on in everybody, and yet the personality remains. Your 
child has changed in looks and knowledge, and yet it is 
yours. You, too, have lost your bloom and strength, 
and yet your selfhood is not destroyed. With your 
resurrection body your proper identity will not be im- 
paired. That is your body through which the soul 
expresses itself, which is the instrument of its thought 
and will. We cannot describe the new body any fur- 
ther than to say that it will be fitted to us as perfectly 
as is this mortal body for its service here ; only its state 
will be higher, its uses more glorious. You need have 
no fear of not knowing those you love. For what about 
their appearance now is most expressive to your hearts t 
Is it so much weight, color, physical force, or the mean- 
ings that look out of the soul, — the smile, the tone, the 
light of the face, the indescribable air? Perhaps that 
babe will have grown to manhood or womanhood before 
you see it again, that friend have caught new beauty in 
the Paradisiacal clime, the radiance of purer affection 
fill those loving eyes. But whatever the change, " you 
will know and be known." The familiar voice will be 
recognized, sweeter doubtless, yet the dear old voice 
with the accents of heaven in its tones. The expression 
that meant so much to you on earth will only be love- 
lier still. The winsomeness of that child that you put 



THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 131 

away amid the summer blossoms, and the charm of that 
dear presence that you missed so sadly, will greet you 
again. Not a line that is characteristic of the real per- 
sonality shall be effaced. 

But what is so glorious is the permanence of this ex- 
istence. The body " is sown in weakness," — ah, how 
weak! — but "is raised in power." The spiritual body 
is immortal. Evil cannot touch it. A great proportion 
of human affliction is connected with the body. How 
many are infirm from birth, life-long martyrs to disease, 
which darkens the earth and kills their joy. Think of 
tlie great multitude who are smitten, and the manifold 
ills that crowd the path of their decay. There is not a 
house unvisited. You who have suffered in this way, 
and have seen your friends suffer, who know what the 
sick-room means, and the infirmities that weary and 
discourage and hinder the cunning of hand and brain, 
you need not be told of the desirableness of a body un- 
touched by disease, and elastic with an immortal vigor. 
And this is assured the Christian when the mortal puts 
on immortality. There shall be no more crying or pain, 
no failing pulse, and aching heart, or breathless remains. 
The former things are passed away. 

But more than this. Here we realize not only the 
sufferings of the body, but its inadequacy in achieving 
ends that seem to be intimated in our highest estimate 
of life. We are confined in a certain sense by the limi- 
tations of the flesh. A heaviness resulting from a mor- 
bid physical condition often lies upon the soul. The 
mind suffers eclipse through bodily injury. Then, too, 



132 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE, 

when most gloriously uplifted in spirit, we feel that these 
clay walls interfere with our clearer illumination, with a 
liberty, and apprehensions that seem possible, under 
more favorable conditions, to the soul. It is in harmony 
with the nature of things to believe that by a higher 
and finer organization, a more spiritual vehicle, we 
could enter into a more profound communion with what 
is divine, could do more that is useful and joy-giving, 
and rise to an experience of what is now seen only in 
glimpses in the more ecstatic states. 

Now, it is likely that the spiritual body will have just 
those capabilities that fit it for higher discoveries, uses, 
and enjoyments than are possible here. We shall be 
changed, and made like Christ's glorious body. Of His 
resurrection body we know but little, but in its power to 
appear and disappear, to seem tangible, and at the same 
time to be unobstructed in its movement by material 
things, in its swiftness of transit from place to place, 
and its various phases of appearance, we have the key 
to its wondrous character and possibilities. For the 
human soul to have a vesture like His is evidence 
enough that all that is needed for its noblest service 
and enjoyment will be provided. 

In the present body, as I have said, we are conscious 
often of being embarrassed, hindered, cabined, held 
back in the effort to climb and enjoy. But with the 
immortal one, what may not be the glorious realizations 
of life ? No doubt veils will be taken away from sights 
of surpassing loveliness. No doubt clogs will be re- 
moved that restrained us from a higher communion 



THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 133 

with the Infinite. No doubt the spiritual sense will 
have keener sagacity, the affectionate nature richer play, 
the mind a grander power of insight and appropriation. 
I suppose that the activities that are put forth then in 
the high ardors of intelligence and enjoyment will be in 
a direction accordant with the noblest opportunities of 
the soul ; that all the movements of the heart will be 
right, that the vision of God, the apprehension of the 
Eternal Love, will be more glorious and ravishing than 
any thing it is possible for us to know on earth. As 
progress is the great law of being, we have the right to 
think that the fruitions of life will be more manifold and 
satisfying, and that the blessed ones shall illustrate in 
their looks, their activities, and their knowledge more 
and more that reflects the glory of the infinite Goodness. 
We might attempt to portray the new splendors admitted 
by the finer texture of the spiritual body, the closer in- 
timacies of immortal friendships, the strange loveliness 
beaming out of souls bathed in God's pure light, and 
their joy in the consciousness of everlasting possessions 
and securities. But it is only the general facts that we 
are assured of, — as to details we know absolutely noth- 
ing. It is enough that we shall be changed, — this 
vehicle of the soul shall be like Christ's own glorious 
body, suited to its place and destiny. All shall live. 
But while some shall shine as stars for ever and ever, 
others shall come forth to contempt and shame. 

So it is life of which we are assured by our victorious 
and risen Lord. Easter is the great festival of life, and 
all its joyful significance centres here. When we are 



134 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

most truly ourselves, in purest and happiest moods, the 
sense of life and its blessing is very precious. Con- 
scious of what is sweet, and gracious, and beautiful in 
existence, you do not want your self to be obliterated. 
The thought of being put away from the sights of the 
fair earth, to thrill no more with the delights of noble 
endeavor, to rejoice no more in dear companionships 
and inspiring knowledge, and to gaze entranced no 
more on the divine perfections, is hateful to you. You 
want to live on and on, freer, happier, stronger, wiser, 
of course, but you want to live ; and the symbols and 
intimations of life are all around you. You feel it in 
the genial air, the fragrant morning, the bird that sings, 
the flower that looks laughingly up in the April sun, 
in the glee of children, — yea, in the deep wells of your 
inmost self. And now, at this fresh season, as Nature 
is rehabiting herself in garments of beauty, and things 
fair and pleasant bring back to memory so much that 
has sweetened your years, you hear as gladly as ever the 
voices of life. But, ah ! there are voices that you do not 
hear. There are hands that you touch no more. There 
are faces that you loved to look upon that have passed 
away. And you know that you too must vanish from 
this scene after a little space. But is this the end? 
Are no fairer landscapes to smile around you? Are 
you never to gather up the golden links of knowledge 
and friendship that were broken here by death? Are 
you to walk no more amid the beloved and holy ones as 
of old ? Are the great, choice treasures of the soul to 
be spilled beyond recovery ? Is Christ to be no longer 



THE SPIRITUAL BODY. 



dear ? Is life to shake down its ripe, delicious fruits for 
you in no more radiant clime ? Is there no heavenly- 
Father to receive you to His everlasting arms ? Ah ! 
you cannot accept the realm of blank and nothingness 
as yours. You spurn the dark negations of the materi- 
alist that deny to the soul life and home and joy. 
Your being springs forward in its mighty yearnings for 
life. Your heart runs on hungrily for the fruitions of 
the eternal ages. You grasp lovingly the assurance of 
the Redeemer's victory over death. You see your su- 
preme desires met in the great and precious promises : 
" I am the Resurrection and the Life ; " " and God shall 
wipe away all tears from their eyes ; " " and there shall 
be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying ; " ^' and 
there shall be no more curse ; " " and there shall be no 
night there,'' " for the Lord God giveth them light ; " 
and they shall see His face," — the Love that filleth all ; 
they shall be like Him, " and His name shall be in their 
foreheads ; " " and they shall reign for ever and ever." 
This is the great Easter of Eternity. How easy to be- 
lieve it all where the soul has risen with Christ to new- 
ness of life. The decaying vanishes. Evil dies. Sorrow 
and sin are left behind. Mortality is swallowed up of 
life. In the spiritual body you abide, and your joy 



is full. 



" For here we have 110 coittmuiitg city^ but we seek one to 
co77iey — Hebrews xiii. 14. 



XII. 

PALINGENESIS. 

T^HE Easter-tide continually speaks of the cheerful 
aspects of life, and the season of the year itself 
wherein it falls is a season of brightness and promise ; and 
so naturally our thoughts are turned to topics that have 
the Easter light upon them. There is something in the 
returning sweetness of spring-time that is quietly inspir- 
ing to every one, and to the heart that takes the mean- 
ing of the living Christ into the realities of awakening 
nature, the suggestions of life are peculiarly encourag- 
ing and impressive. One aspect of our existence here 
is always saddening, from the fact that it is a suffering 
condition, and apparently a perishable one. What we 
call the evils of the world are manifold ; and, after an 
experience of them, comes inevitable death. But to 
regard merely the pains and griefs of mankind — dis- 
ease, decrepitude, burial — is by no means a fair sight 
of it. There is quite another view from this, and even 
what seems so afflictive has a better interpretation than 
that which appears on the surface. The whole ten- 
dency of creation is upward, — the march of being is 
not to death, but to higher life. Amid decay, catastro- 
phes, dissolution, and apparent annihilation, there is 
renewal, progress, an exaltation, which transcends the 
state that is passed. No one can take a calm and pro- 



138 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

found survey of the world without being struck with the 
constant steps of a dying and a living, a burial and a 
birth, whose resultant is something better than before. 
All that bears the image of death is not absolute de- 
struction. The throes of painful effort are the throes 
of life. As far back as the eye of science can track the 
processes of change which constitute creation, it is plain 
that the steps are forward, not backward. The new is 
ever coming out of the old. There is a gain in the ful- 
ness and excellence of life. The fluid splendor of the 
primeval earth, yet landless and lifeless, was higher 
than the vaporous mass out of which it sprang. The 
reign of pristine storm and convulsions, during which 
the crust of the earth cooled for the foundations of its 
first inhabitants, was better than the incandescent globe. 
And when there were waters and lands, vegetation and 
animal life, the reality was nobler than the awful scenes 
of tempest and cataclysm of the anterior stage. And so 
on through the cycles of physical being that have ensued 
since the upheavals of the continents and the existence 
of mankind, though there has been so much decay and 
death, there is a constant movement to stages higher 
and more perfect. It is true that vast wildernesses of 
vegetation have perished, but their vitality has resurrec- 
tion in the coal measures that contribute to the utilities 
of mankind. The microzoa, the infinitesimal infusoria, 
and the nummulites in mountainous masses, have passed 
to their burial, making solid rocks of enormous dimen- 
sions. Paris is built of these nummulites ; so are the 
pyramids and the sphinx. Dead animalculae make 



PALINGENESIS, 139 



gigantic mountain ranges and widely pave the depths of 
seas. And the rocks themselves disintegrate, and great 
forests die, but the result is the soil in which fruits and 
grains are produced for food. 

The highest form of life that we are permitted to know 
is human life, and its history in a large view is a record 
of progress. The difference between the barbarian and 
the Christian saint is tremendous, and yet the highest 
form of manhood only shows what humanity is capable 
of, under favorable conditions. The point that has 
been reached by the most advanced peoples has come 
by leaving the injurious and unprofitable, and using 
methods better, wiser, and more divine. With clearer 
truth, with more knowledge, with larger facilities, the 
race has advanced, yet its steps are marked all along 
by battles and burials. But out of conflict has come 
strength. From painful experiences has been acquired 
a sagacity, to mitigate their severity. There has been a 
continual emergence from the bondage of superstition 
and slavery toward light and freedom. All along there 
has been a gain in useful knowledge, in government, 
and religion. The usages that were once terrible and 
destructive, the follies of opinion and custom, the evils 
that harass and cripple life, are more and more over- 
come and buried. Even the great convulsions of king- 
doms and the downfal^^of dynasties have contributed to 
set the race forward. Of course we cannot discover 
progress except by the comparison of aspects of man- 
kind at wide intervals of time. We see the most offen- 
sive features of the present, and our consideration of 



I40 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

near individual cases of moral turpitude and wickedness 
is apt to prejudice our judgment as to the general con- 
dition. While there is sufficient now in the vices and 
miseries of mankind to shock our hearts, and to urge 
our solicitude into practical endeavor, a fair sight of the 
facts of remoter ages tends to assure us that an improve- 
ment in every vital interest has been realized. 

When we come to the individual who is using the 
light that favors him, we still note the encouraging 
tokens of life that is advancing. On the surface is 
much, it is true, that indicates a hard allotment ; for 
whose life is quite free from besetment ? The spectacle 
is confessedly an affecting picture, and the lookout, to 
all, is sad sometimes. The questions with many who 
have had a severe experience are these : Is life really a 
boon ? Are its joys a compensation for all its pains, bur- 
dens, tribulations ? There glow and vanish the youth- 
ful fervors in which faith is so strong, and the heart so 
sincere.- The splendid anticipations that inspired early 
effort perish. Aspiration leads on and on, but where is 
the full attainment? The royal hopes of a pure ambi- 
tion fail. There are experienced defeats, humiliations, 
alienations, hostilities. The sacred places of affection 
are darkly invaded. Broken friendships strew the past. 
Great vacancies are made in home. There seems to be, 
in the cases of some, no end to disaster. And so with 
cares, worryments, sorrows, — one thinks, perchance, 
What does it all avail ? Will there ever be any thing 
better? How many, as their years increase and their 
cares get heavy, make this inquiry in the silence of 



PALINGENESIS. 141 



their own mind, while they still continue to plod on in 
their daily pursuit, saying nothing of their depression ? 
The music and enchantment of life are gone. Its dis- 
tant horizon is dark. 

Now, without ignoring facts like these, life still has 
its hopeful features and encouraging reality. It is or- 
dained to go on, but, as in every thing else, there has to 
be a dying for a living. The heats of youth moderate, 
but they have given an impulse to character and en- 
deavor. In the radiance of high dreams are conceived 
strong purposes to do and conquer. With the decline 
of hope and enthusiasm there is a residuum of valuable 
experience and rugged strength that would not have 
been without the incited activity. A tougher fibre of 
will and endurance is born in hardship. So in the steps 
that mark the soul true to Qirist and the law of life, 
there is not absolute loss as its journey proceeds, but 
gain. The foundations are laid for a better super- 
structure. All the forces of good that have had influ- 
ence continue to work, though, it may be, in different 
ways. You have buried, it seems to you, a good deal 
that once was precious ; and, thinking over what you were, 
you lament now the absence of the fresh emotion, the 
bounding pulse, the elastic spirits, the holy enthusiasm, 
the glow of high pursuit, that once were yours, when life 
seemed fair. But if you have maintained your Christian 
fidelity, there has been no actual loss. Without that 
ardor and affection and sympathy with the pure and 
true, you would not be what you are now. You carry 
along with you the gains of affection and faith and 



142 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

duty and virtue, as the great globe carries the harvests 
of all its changes in itself. The structure of your real 
being is thus built up, and if it could be analyzed, and 
put under the powerful lenses of spirit, it would show 
the resultants of the aspiring heart and the teeming 
brain, the raptures of prayer and the communion of life 
with God. All this gives the tints and tones and apti- 
tudes and qualities of being that have come through 
years of experience and a following of the Master. The 
life of all that was good in thought and possession is 
there yet, and you take it on whither you go. The out- 
ward man perishes, fades, changes, dies ; the inward 
man is renewed day by day. Life goes forward gather- 
ing, in the divine love, more and more that enriches it, 
and sure of the restoration of what seems perhaps ex- 
tinct. Not a breath of happiness has come to you in 
vain. No friendly communion with a pure and true 
soul has been unfruitful. You have been moved by no 
holy ardors, and been the subject of no blessed vision 
of divine reality, without profit. None of the struggle 
and the faith of your best moments has been unavailing. 
The love that enabled you to minister patiently, and to 
endure submissively, wrought a finer texture in the soul. 
The inward man is renewed day by day in fellowship 
with the good, in its hospitality to heavenly disclosures, 
as the gracious spirit quickens and the heart rejoices in 
the blessed Comforter. As you are drawn out more in 
sympathies that make you tender and helpful to the 
needy ; as in the sight of glorious examples you are 
stirred to emulate them ; as your nature takes hold of 



PALINGENESIS. 1 43 

the deep truths of Jesus with a gush of gratitude ; as the 
purity and grace of Hves that are dearest give you re- 
freshment, and so, being separated more and more from 
the base and bad, made stronger to do and suffer, and 
still firmer in your hold upon the eternal life, — you are 
experienciiig a gracious renewal. You are getting 
nearer the Lord of life. A taint is passing away. There 
is an inflowing of strength and peace. Patience is hav- 
ing its perfect v/ork. The spirit of the Master deepens 
within, and whatever is sweet and pure in your posses- 
sion is due to Him. 

Of course you cannot remain here always in the body. 
This is not your continuing city, but you seek one. 
You want an everlasting refuge, — home, security, rest, 
a heavenly joy. And the way is open to it. The vitalities 
of the spiritual life do not and cannot perish. The poet 
Longfellow, giving voice to the heart that realizes that 
time has taken away so much that gave life its charm 
and freshness and delight, breaks out in lofty song : — 

" * Oh give me back/ I cried, * the vanished splendors, 
The breath of morn, and the exultant strife, 
When the swift stream of life 
Bounds o'er its rocky channel, and surrenders 
The pond, with all its lilies, for the leap 
Into the unknown deep ! ' 

" And the sea answered, with a lamentation, 
Like some old prophet wailing, and it said : 
* Alas ! thy youth is dead ! 
It breathes no more, its heart has no pulsation ; 
In the dark places with the dead of old 
It lies for ever cold ! * 



144 EASTER AND EASTER^TIDE, 

"*Then,' said I, 'from its consecrated cerements 
I will not drag this sacred dust again, 
Only to give me pain ; 
But, still remembering all the lost endearments, 
Go on my way, like one who looks before 
And turns to weep no more.' " 

There is, indeed, no occasion for weeping when we look 
before with that faith which is the evidence of things not 
seen. Nothing vanishes for ever that gives loveliness and 
purity to the soul. Even the tints and odors and beauty 
of things most evanishing to the eye touch us not in vain. 
As the good and dear are buried out of your sight, as 
youth dies, as the years bear you on to trial and pain, you 
are carrying onward, if walking with the Master, more and 
more that shall bloom again and adorn your larger life 
when mortality is all swallowed up. And so, looking out 
on the opening season, on the faces of children that cling 
to you, and of friends that are true ; thinking over the 
days of your vanished prime, and the joys which came 
so often in a loving service that you have not strength 
to render now, — you are not to grow sad as if all that 
were gone for ever, as if you were mocked by a loveli- 
ness that you could not keep, as if the kernel of exist- 
ence were almost consumed, and soon all would be as 
if you had not been. No ; you are not to look at things 
in this way, — you cannot, indeed, in the tender and un- 
erring sympathy of Christ. The divine promises are all 
glorious of the hereafter. The instinct of the pious soul 
is to foreshadow the ages in the reaches of faith and 
affection. You have known some dead one, perhaps, 



PALINGENESIS, 145 



whose nature was rarely sensitive to all the gifts of life ; 
who, in the hours of her fading, told what she wished 
should be done when she could speak no more : how the 
white lilies of the valley were to lie in her folded hands 
on her bosom, and the violets were to be planted on her 
grave ; how she wished the hymns that were so dear in 
life sung again, though her lips were still, and those 
companions of her girlhood to gather beside her, and 
that pastor who had been her friend to say the holy ser- 
vice of the church as she was put away. What is such 
an expression but a conviction that life continues to be 
conscious, — but the heart projecting its faith and friend- 
ship beyond the grave? And, verily, we may do this. 
The continuing city is beyond this one. The outward 
man decays, but the life renewed in Christ abides, where 
all will be better, ■ — more blessed. So the light of Eas- 
ter-tide that falls on your advanced age, or your afflicted 
homes, should not be sad, but very sweet. The spring 
blossoms, and the voices of singing-birds and of running 
waters, and the laugh of children, and the contentment 
of the household, are all enveloped in it. You do not 
leave the good and fair. The old friendship, the old 
visions of celestial beauty, the old voices, the old delight 
in duty and in holy devotions that so calmed and re- 
freshed you, — all that woke in your heart gratulations, 
praise, and a blessed looking forward, — all are yours 
in the land where you go ; and with all are the better 
treasures of your Father's house. 



" The flowers appear on the earth ; the time of the singing 
of birds is corned — Song of Solomon ii. 12. 



XIII. 

THE TIME OF THE SINGING OF BIRDS. 

T SUPPOSE that no truly religious nature can look on 
the works of God without some sensibility to their 
significance. While every season has its peculiar in- 
terest, and while all nature is constantly unfolding its 
glorious and inspiring lessons, there seems something 
especially tender and affecting in the return of the 
spring-time, and the associations and suggestions con- 
nected with it. The change, from the rigors of winter 
to the softer airs and the budding luxuriance of the 
more genial season, is marked and forcible. Some- 
thing more delicate than articulate speech invites us 
abroad, and wins us to pensiveness and hope. We are 
haunted by the indescribable sense of the great mystery 
of life that is unfolding in bud and flower, and pulsating 
the landscape that brightens beneath the sun. How 
confidently the frail plant puts forth its tendrils, and 
how^ gaily the young leaves wave in the amber light! 
With what serene order the hidden beauties of the for- 
est, the grain of the fields, the pets of the garden, the 
stately monarchs of the grove, develop their foliage, and 
join the grand march of nature through the wondrous 
year? Watching this glorious transformation which 
goes on in the fair forms around us, and touched by 



148 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE, 

the sweet spell of fresh and outbursting life, it is not 
strange that the reverent Christian heart should catch a 
feeling quite in unison with the prophecies of all that is 
so bright and joyous in the world. Spring-time is indeed 
the season of hope. From the faint glow of the plant, 
from the exquisite fragrance of flowers, from the low 
notes of happy birds, we are taught to look forward for 
some better experience, some riper delight. We can- 
not, feeling that the Infinite Father is expressing His 
goodness in all that is so promising around us, — we can- 
not help making the pictures of life in the future a little 
more like the beauty that finds its way to the adoring 
mind. We feel that these scenes, which grow more 
attractive day by day, are the expressive symbols of a 
nobler state of being ; and so we let Hope take the rosy 
coloring of the season's cheerfulness. Especially is this 
so in our younger days, while as yet the rough journey 
of life is untried. Who, indeed, with a soul in any 
manner alive to the messages of God in His word or 
works has not, in early manhood or womanhood, felt 
the deep stirrings of spring-time, and gazed on brighter 
landscapes than any pictured to the outward eye ? Feel- 
ing, impulse, affection seemed to partake the freshness 
of the blossoming year. I do not now speak of disap- 
pointments which sooner or later fall upon the holiest 
of those who walk with God, nor do I seek now to ex- 
plain the dark problems that are connected with our 
existence here, but I do say that it is a blessed thing 
that it is the privilege of man, especially in his younger 
days, to hope. Few, perhaps, would have courage to 



THE TIME OF THE SINGING OF BIRDS. 149 

pursue their painful toils and meet the shocks and trials 
before them, if they could see at one glance all that 
they may eventually suffer. It is a merciful provision 
that we are permitted, even while least prepared to bear 
a heavy burden, to take cheerful views of life, that only 
leaf by leaf the histor}'- of our experience is written, and 
that light falls on our future so far in the flush of early 
years, that the world is never wholly dark. Though 
with our advancing steps the scenery around us becomes 
more sober, and perhaps our path more difficult, the 
change is gradual, and for a space, at least, almost un- 
heeded. As the spring glides into summer, and the 
summer into autumn, with stealthy pace, so do we in- 
sensibly pass from the freshness and promise of our 
brightest days. If the heart is teachable and devout, 
this early radiance that bathes it, this efflorescence of 
generous hopes, should not be regarded as vain and 
unprofitable. While the spring sun shines, it is meet 
that the most delicate tendrils should put forth, and 
that Nature should wear her gayest smile. So in the 
spring-time of life it is no marvel if the heart catch a 
corresponding glow, and blossom with a kindred luxuri- 
ance. 

These early experiences of the hopeful, trustful, con- 
secrated soul may be as important to a strong, noble, 
and fruitful life, as the light and bloom of May to the 
wealth and harvests of the year. If the soul be pure, 
and mindful of Him who speaks in many ways to His 
beloved children on earth, we need have no fear of 
sympathizing too deeply with the loveliness around us, 



150 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

or of looking too hopefully on the best aspects of our 
strange existence. Let us feel the nearness and be- 
nignity of Him who " makes the outgoings of the morn- 
ing and evening to praise Him." Let us look on man 
with a trustful and generous interest. Let us kindle 
with the enthusiasm of holy aims and examples, and in 
all the earth behold the signs of a better and happier 
day. It is true that, after a time, the prospect will be 
overcast, and that stern trials will fall to our lot ; still, 
all the while we are learning something deeper and 
more precious than had we never been touched by the 
glorj" of what is brighter than we have attained. This 
is one of God's methods to lead on the believing and 
affectionate nature to a higher maturity and a nobler 
manhood. As the vigor of earthly life subsides, the 
obedient soul feels that its treasures are being gathered 
more securely within, and it clings with fonder grasp to 
that which cannot pass away. 

But while the spring-time is peculiarly the season of 
hope, especially to the young, it is also, to those more 
advanced in life, a season of memory. With the dawn- 
ing beauty of field and flower there are a thousand 
affecting associations. As time passes on, and the 
earth puts on her lustrous robes, we almost unconsciously 
compare our present experience with what has been. 
We turn back the book of memory to the pictures that 
once seemed so fair, and linger in thought about old 
paths that were rosy in our morning. Though hoping 
still, and feeling the voices of the year pass into our 
hearts, our hope is hardly like the old hope that quick- 



THE TIME OF THE SINGING OF BIRDS, 151 

ened our pulses days ago. All that we see now is con- 
nected with some history that is precious or instructive 
to us. Upon the reviving world falls some influence 
from the heart that was not there in former time. 
These green fields, these trees tinged with early garni- 
ture, these sprigs of. bloom, these liquid tones and faint 
odors that penetrate the soul, have meanings that have 
been growing more expressive with each successive 
spring. As these come before us our life rises up again 
as it were from the past, and we stand with our separate 
selves as we have been in our most marked experience. 
And how much returns ? There is not a generous hope, 
not a yearning for the divine perfection, not a sacred 
joy, not a tender sorrow, but is somehow linked with 
this season's beauty and blessing. We think of those 
who were with us in their youthful ardor who are now 
absent, or gathered to their rest. We recall the fervor 
of our trust in the Saviour when all nature seemed 
wearing a more celestial smile. We remember the kind 
hands that once planted the flowers by the door, or ar- 
ranged them on the mantle with loving skill. We sit 
again by the couch of those who faded so calmly into 
the heavenly light, and linger again by the side of those 
who, pale and still and beautiful, can speak to us on 
earth no more. That cluster of bloom from the woods 
brings back volumes that made life sincere. These low 
bird-songs revive the rapture of a heart that saw God 
in all His works, and went out in praises that only the 
affluent music of the year could express. The com- 
monest thing that creeps up from the mold is a memento 



152 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE. 

of something that is dear. Every show of the season is 
associated with a gladness that has departed, a trial 
that is overcome, or a hope that still beams on the future. 
I know that these fresh outgrowths of spring take a 
soberer meaning with those who have seen many sea- 
sons pass, but oh, how much is gathered up and em- 
balmed in its morning glory, and how instructive are 
the suggestions that it brings to the consecrated and 
obedient soul ! Let no man think that he has gained 
any thing on which to congratulate himself by ceasing 
to feel the gentle influences of the fair earth around 
him. Let none vainly imagine that they have grown 
more spiritually minded by an insensibility to the sights 
and sounds of this wondrous frame which we call nat- 
ure, but which is an expression of God, our Father. I 
do not say that great excellence of Christian character 
may not exist with an almost utter blindness to the 
handiwork of the Highest, but such blindness is no 
proof of piety, and is not a legitimate fruit of it. The 
soul that receives most amply the divine light sees in 
its effulgence most that suggests and portrays the divine- 
ness of Him who is all in all. And the closer it is con- 
formed to Christ the more open will it be to views of 
the glory and goodness of the King. That is not an 
enviable nature that hears no strange melodies hinting 
of Heaven through the mystic marches of the year, that 
sees no glorious signs hung out on earth and sky of an 
infinite love that is never forgetful and never unkind, 
that pauses not with reverent spirit to ponder the lesson 
that is told in grass and tree and flower, and that feels 



THE TIME OF THE SINGING OF BIRDS. 153 

no benediction in the bright air and the palpitating sky. 
He may be just to his neighbor, industrious and virtu- 
ous, yet he does not understand the meaning of Jesus 
in the fields of Galilee, pointing to the birds and lilies, 
and telling of our Father's care. 

Some of the most vital experiences of the Christian 
are associated with the glorious world around him. 
Though age dispel the illusions of youth, and steal from 
his possessions much that once gave him delight, still 
there is sensibility left to what God has made so fair. 
One of the greatest of poets, who was at the same time 
a dutiful son of the church, in his advanced life, closes 
his magnificent " Ode on the Intimations of Immortality," 
in these imperishable lines : — 

"And O ye fountains, meadows, hills, and groves, 
Think not of any severing of our loves. 
Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might ; 
I only have relinquished one delight 
To live beneath your more perpetual sway. 
I love the brooks which down their channels fret, 
Even more than when I tripped lightly as they. 
The innocent brightness of a new-born day is lovely yet ; 
The clouds that gather round the setting sun 
Do take a sober coloring from an eye 
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality. 
Another race hath been, and other palms are won. 
Thanks to the human heart by which we live, 
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, its fears, 
To me the meanest flower that blows can give 
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears." 

Yes, and thanks to Him who gives the heart all its 
capabilities of insight and enjoyment. Nothing lovely 



154 EASTER AND EASTER^TIDE. 

in all the circle of the year grows meaningless to those 
who live in the love of Him who pronounced good all 
that He has made. And yet how serenely nature moves 
on, whatever be the lot of man. The same bright things 
come up in the morning sunshine, though blight fall 
upon his affections. The same glory fills the heavens, 
though his soul be shaken with storms of sorrow. The 
very contrast of the spring's lustre and luxuriance with 
his own sad experience sometimes perplexes and de- 
presses him. With that dear one fading by his side, 
with that cherished form cold and voiceless in the house, 
with a feverish pain in his spirit and haunted by a lone- 
liness that finds no rest, it seems to him that the sun 
ought not to shine so brightly, that the groves ought 
not to be so gay, that there is mockery in the sweet 
voices and garish beauty of the earth and sky. Who 
has not felt this in seasons of peculiar trial ? Yet calmly 
and grandly the order of nature went on. The light 
winds played with the tasselled trees and swaying vines. 
The rose and lily changed no hue. The waters frolicked 
and prattled, and ran dimpling down their verdurous 
ways. The clouds wantoned through the deep abysses, 
and caught on their gorgeous robes the golden light. 
The stars looked serenely from their majestic thrones, 
and day and night moved on with imperial pace, as if 
no heart were bleeding and no eyes blind with tears. 
And yet, after a little, when the anguish of emotion is 
past, how quietly, yet how tenderly, do all these glorious 
works of Omnipotence seem to speak, — suggesting a 
perpetual peace and a sympathy that touches the very 



THE TIME OF THE SINGING OF BIRDS. 155 

springs of life, — telling us, by their order, their repose, 
their loveliness, their undisturbed harmony of that which 
lies above fear and sorrow, even of Him who holds all 
things in the hollow of His hand. The devout soul is 
not taught to think that God changes on account of its 
temporary adversity, but it desires to be drawn up to a 
fuller apprehension and a nearer likeness to Him. The 
order of nature indeed will go on whatever our changes 
of feeling or desire. Even in our last moment, when 
we close our eyes on things visible, there will be the same 
ebb and flow of things as in our most joyous hours. 
There is, perhaps, a half hidden and vague feeling in 
the breasts of many that there will be something peculiar 
in the day when they see the last of earth. Perhaps 
they cannot tell exactly what, but still it hardly seems 
that every thing around can then be just the same as 
now. But, my friends, it will be one of those common 
days, such as we are accustomed to, on which we shall 
depart, — one of these common days unmarked by any 
sign more wonderful than of those we heed so little 
now. The same sun will rise and set, the trees wave, 
the birds sing, the harvests ripen, the stars glitter ; there 
will be the same buying and selling, coming and going, 
sorrowing and rejoicing, as now. 

** The gay will laugh 
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care 
Plod on, and each one as before will chase 
His favorite phantom." 

But, thanks be to God, all this can make no difference 
to the sanctified and Christly soul. He who guides tlie 



156 EASTER AND EASTER-TIDE, 

great universe has revealed Himself as our Father, and 
all the excellence of His works but faintly picture the 
exceeding riches and glory of that life to which He calls 
us in Jesus Christ, His Son, who, for us, has conquered 
death and unveiled immortality. O my friends, while 
this charming season is kindling our hopes and awak- 
ening old memories, and hinting of that boundless " love 
that keeps in its complacent arms the earth, the air, the 
deep," let us seek those spiritual treasures, that unde- 
caying beauty of which the outward world is but the 
faint and imperfect metaphor! 



WHITSUNTIDE. 



" They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; 
they shall mount up with wings as eagles.''^ — Isaiah 
xl. 31, 



XIV. 

WINGS. 

nPHE real marrow of life is in its higher experiences. 
The exultant moods are always the most joyous. 
We manage to endure a great deal that is disagreeable 
and depressing, if now and then come seasons of spir- 
itual uplifting, moments of soul-glow and sunrise, when 
we are translated from the low flats of a dull earthly 
monotony to higher levels and better fellowships. 

" They shall mount up on wings as eagles," says the 
Prophet. This is our privilege. The soul is free. It 
has wings in the joy of pure emotion, in the upspring- 
ing might of faith, in the ardor of heavenly aspiration, 
in the swift flight of love, in the liberty of exultant 
hope. 

With some these wings are often folded. They droop 
often through sheer weariness. They trail frequently 
in the dust. But again they shine in the clear air of 
cerulean heights. The sunlight of truth is on them. 
On their strong pinions life is held above defeats and 
woe. Making ample allowance for differences in tem- 
perament and scope of thought in individuals, the de- 
vout nature is not ignorant of blessed experiences that 
impel the soul onward, — sympathies, insights, ardors, — 



[ 6 O WHITS UN TIDE. 



refreshing and enriching to the hidden Hfe. A few hints 
will awaken precious memories. 

You remember how the spring odors of the tender- 
leaved woods seized your finer sense as you came forth 
from the place of prayer, and wafted your thought to 
the trees of Paradise ; and how, on the billowy splen- 
dors of indescribable sunsets, you were borne to the 
gates of light, which seemed uplifted, as if to welcome 
the King of Glory; and how, on the mountain-top, as 
day flung its roses over the sky, and kissed the wide 
waters to crimson, you were borne afar ; and how, awed 
and ravished beneath the midnight stars, you seemed to 
wander through the eternal deeps amid the blossoming 
constellations, until you almost heard the sphery har- 
mony, and touched the uncreated throne I More than 
once, in the solitude and by the sea, amid the noon's 
delicious peacefulness, and when the fresh winds blew 
health and music out of the west, over leagues of prairie 
starred with unnumbered flowers, your heart overran 
with sacred emotion, and expanded to embrace the 
beautiful repose ! Wings were yours. 

Then, too, after a season of spiritual depression,- 
where you had gone mournfully with a sense of barren- 
ness and burden, the painful spell was finally broken, 
and you seemed set in " a large place.'' Aye, your soul 
bounded outward into blessed light. Great freedom 
was yours, and you wondered wdiy such doubt could 
have fettered the faith that now exults in the joyful con- 
fidence of a son beloved. And so, too, when the news 
of that dear friend's espousal of Christ reached you ; 



WINGS. i6l 



when the darling child of many prayers went with you, 
for the first time, to the table of the Lord ; when the 
prodigal, who had made the house so sorrowful, came 
back with the glow of forgiveness on his brow ; and 
when, gathered around the old hearth-stone, at the 
family festival, the unutterable peace of God came 
down, — on what gracious wings were you upborne ! 
What refreshing renewal was yours! 

You remember how, before now, you have come into 
the church, heavy, gloomy, discouraged, an evil world 
shadowing your hope, and life looking sepulchral and 
poor amid earth's losses and changes and delusions, 
and how hymn and psalm and confession and prayer 
have little by little stolen away your unrest, and then 
how the word of grace uttered from the depths of a pro- 
phetic soul flowed with healing and light and comfort to 
your heart, and how, on the wings of its benediction, 
you rose up stronger and clearer visioned, and went 
forth as on the landscape of a better world. 

And so when the evil spirit of wrath and revenge 
was cast from you, and self conquered in granting for- 
giveness that linked your life in closer bonds to one 
estranged ; when, bowing in the great congregation 
where a thousand hearts went up in importunate sup- 
plication, or in triumphant Te Deums stormed heaven 
with praise, you rose on the wave of devotion, and when 
all at once the transcendent vision of Love incarnate 
and on the cross burst with illustrious glory on your 
soul, then there was no dull plodding in the way, — 
pinions were at your feet. 



1 62 WHITSUNTIDE, 



But it is in the closet, if you live nobly, that your 
strength is most graciously renewed. There, with the 
world put away, with faith resting serenely on the prom- 
ise, while the place seemed instinct with a hallowing 
presence, you waited for your Lord. Nay, you waited 
with your Lord, for He came in and supped with you, 
and you with Him. On Him you emptied all your 
burdens and your sins. It was enough to feel the 
pulses of His peerless love, to see life's consummate 
ideal met in His perfection, enough to see every thorn 
of His crown of suffering blossom into celestial ana- 
dems, and to rest without a doubt in the tabernacle of 
His peace. Perhaps you are one who, in the wondrous 
disclosures of these hours, can say, "whether in the 
body, or out of the body, I cannot tell." 

We give grudgingly, we labor in heaviness, we minis- 
ter painfully, we worship coldly, we live meanly, until 
the higher life is begotten within us, — until the soul 
gets a glow and an earnestness and a breadth of sym- 
pathy, and an impulse of high and pure aspiration, that 
make it a joy to do good. Love is always winged. If 
you would conquer your besetments, rise to a more gra- 
cious benevolence, enjoy a livelier consciousness of 
eternal things, and have your Christian duties delight- 
ful ; get the ardent, unselfish, consecrated haert of love, 
through the grace of the Holy Spirit, the Inspirer and 
Comforter. 

It were easy to picture more in detail instances of 
these spiritual upliftings in the fervor of your first dis- 
cipleship, in times of blessed awakening in the churches, 



WINGS. 163 



and in all your most precious experiences. But these 
are all revived as you recall the bright places of your 
pilgrimage. Through their impulse you have done your 
most genuine work for Christ, have had the clearest 
glimpses of the heavenly beatitude, and have gathered 
the choicest fruits of holiness. These experiences give 
the lie to an atheistic materialism. They strangle 
doubts of our immortality. They attest our divine re- 
lationship. In these illuminations the letter of Scripture 
delivers a grander and more inspiring meaning. In 
them we antedate the everlasting life. 



^'And all that sat in the coimcil^ looking steadfastly o?i 
hini^ saw his face as it had been the face of an 
angeiy — Acts vi. 15. 



XV. 

SOUL-LIGHT. 

TIZHEN Stephen stood before the Sanhedrim, ac- 
cused, insulted, and exposed to imminent danger, 
it is said that those looking on him " saw his face as it 
had been the face of an angel." The inner light of his 
rapt and loving and holy soul beamed through the 
fleshly lineaments. His countenance glowed with the 
spiritual beauty of the celestial world. Though in this 
case we must concede a preternatural effulgence to the 
features of the martyr, still something akin to it is seen 
in all whose lives are the abodes of the Sanctifier. 
There is no such lasting and impressive beauty as that 
which adorns a nature rich in magnanimous sentiments 
and pure affections. The Truth, which satisfies and 
inspires the saintly life, modulates the tone, beams in 
the eye, trembles on the lip, and suffuses the face with 
the sheen of its unmistakable sincerity and grace. 

Much, indeed, that is most characteristic in the indi- 
vidual is betrayed in the outward man. Let him be 
consumed by a ravenous greed ; let him be the slave of 
a grovelling lust ; let him nurse his resentments into a 
sullen hate, and wear the nettles of his irritating envies 
against his heart, and, in a cruel and consuming ambi- 
tion, crush down the generous instincts of affection and 



l66 WHITSUNTIDE. 

charity, — and the features of his true character shall 
flash out, in spite of his personal comeliness and most 
careful concealments. 

That hungry look of avaricious cunning ; that settled 
scowl on the remorseless brow j that habitual sneer, 
that becomes more significant when a rival is praised ; 
that hard, defiant expression, from which children in- 
stinctively shrink ; the gloating eye and mocking face, 
— tell, plainer than any words, the master-passion that 
reigns within. 

No one of an observing turn has ever passed through 
the crowded thoroughfares of a great city without not- 
ing the fearful meanings that many faces reveal of lives 
that are wasted, darkened, and wofully astray. It is 
almost as if you heard, as they pass, " I am pursuing 
the victim of my lust or hate." " Religion is a delusion 
which I spurn.'' " I do not believe in virtue.'' " I am 
bound to make my golden idol more magnificent." " I 
live merely for pleasure." " Hell is already burning in 
my heart." 

But if the spirit of evil, when sufficiently dominant, 
writes its significant characters on the countenance, so 
does the spirit of goodness in a halo of light. Out of 
the pure, the true, the devoted soul go the sign and 
token of its nobility. Few have failed to notice how in 
a rapture of unexpected delight one's look is transfig- 
ured ; how that which is ordinarily plain and uninterest- 
ing, in the exaltation of sublime sentiments, seems to 
vanish before the light flowing from within. So, where 
life is settled in a steadfast virtue, where the temper has 



SOUL-LIGHT, 167 



become sweet by the long discipline of resignation, 
where the atmosphere of the heart is holy and com- 
nmnion with the invisible world is unbroken, — there the 
inner spirit softens, irradiates, spiritualizes the outer 
man. That placid sweetness of the saint, that chastened 
radiance of the countenance, remains amid the changes 
of age and sorrow. You find it with those who were 
not born fair, and with those who have trod rough ways 
and tasted bitter trials. Ther^ are those to-day who 
go bowed with their infirmities, who are browned and 
scarred by unremitting toil, who carry the burden of 
unspoken griefs ; maidens who never expect to see 
another May on earth but this, and matrons whose 
wrinkled brows tell of years almost done ; pallid suffer- 
ers propped up, on pillows to look once more on the 
green fields of spring and inhale its fragrant air ; and 
old men, who, having patiently done the Master's will, 
are ready to depart in peace, on whose faces is already 
the dawning radiance of the heavenly day. I enter the 
humble abode of one whose life has been a long strug- 
gle with poverty, and who yet, amid many opportunities 
to secure unrighteous gain, has never swerved from his 
integrity j and as, looking away with the eye of faith to 
the better inheritance, he speaks of his heavenly treas- 
ures with the blessed assurance of a possession which 
he already begins to enjoy, I see in his smile a celestial 
beam. On my way amid the sick and wretched I meet 
a true angel of mercy, who daily brings to sad homes 
and obscure sufferers help and hope ; and, in the sweet 
sympathy that overspreads her face, and the patient 



1 68 WHITSUNTIDE. 



kindness that smooths her tranquil brow, I am reminded 
of those who minister on high. I listen to the trem- 
bling tones of this aged mother in Israel, as she recounts 
the story of her pilgrimage, — the precious refreshments 
of a way that was so often overshadowed, — the endear- 
ing fellowship of Jesus, when, in pain and bereavement, 
the world was bleak and dark ; and as, gathering the 
divine promises still nearer her heart, she seems to ante- 
date the joy into which in a little time she shall pass, I 
see on her face, not the deep furrows of venerable years 
and the lost freshness of girlhood^ but an immortal 
beauty that cannot die. I mingle with the multitude, 
and there is pointed out to me the Christian philanthro- 
pist, who has resolutely breasted the rude shocks of the 
world's conflict ; who, in the midst of hypocrisy and 
covetousness and wrong, has kept the high purpose of 
his youth to benefit his race; and who, fired with the 
spirit of his Master, esteems it his highest honor to 
serve his "little ones," without hope of a material 
reward : and there is visible on those benignant feat- 
ures — calm, open, and fearless in his confidence of 
truth's final victory — an illumination caught from the 
Light of Life. And, as I kneel by this dying saint, 
who, having in meekness and simplicity followed her 
Lord, and gathered into her consecrated affections the 
graces of His own character, now exclaims, " I am 
ready to depart," while the smile of her lips, that just 
move in inaudible praise, tells of fruition begun, and 
the eyes that look upward are full of rapturous light, 
and the blessed awe of the place is as if the gate of 



SOUL-LIGHT. 169 



heaven were for a moment left ajar, I " see her face 
as it were the face of an angel." 

Thus it is that the inner spirit is reflected outwardly, 
and betrays its source. No loveliness on earth is equal 
to that which blossoms from the pure, generous, affec- 
tionate, and consecrated soul. All other beauty fades 
and perishes ; but this is immortal, and will expand 
into rarer flower in the everlasting light above. 



" Heaven a?td earth shall pass aivay : hut my words shall 
not pass awayy — Luke xxi. 33. 



XVI. 

WORDS. 

T^O the untaught and unlettered nothing seems more 
substantial than the great globe and the majestic 
frame of things visible. But here really change and 
decay are most certain and unceasing. The adamantine 
rocks crumble. Continents gradually melt away. The 
stars go out in the infinite heavens overhead. Nothing 
is absolutely fixed in the material universe so that there 
continues permanence of form and constitution ; noth- 
ing is fixed here except the eternal laws by which change 
is effected and the divine order secured. Our earth 
itself has been for uncounted ages a theatre of muta- 
tion, which still goes on. From the attenuated gases of 
chaotic space, through the divine economy, at length 
came the firm earth and its manifold forms, prepared 
for the habitation of man. But at no time since the 
beginning was reached a period when all was stationary, 
to suffer no more change. Convulsion has followed 
convulsion. There have been upheavals of mountains 
and submergences of vast lands ; earthquakes and del- 
uge ; volcanic fires and the dreadful desolation of arctic 
rigor; seas where now are fruitful prairies, and fiery floods, 
where bloom orchards and gardens ; while regions once 



1 7 2 WHITS UN TIDE. 



inhabited sleep beneath tlie ocean, and populous cities 
lie deep in awful graves. And still in these later ages 
the change goes on, imperceptible, it may be, to the busy 
tribes of men, except when some sudden catastrophe 
smites them with flood or fire, — yet surely, and with a 
ceaseless decay. Slowly, if you please, but with a cer- 
tain march, the material universe approaches its disso- 
lution. The time of the end will finally come. The 
heavens and earth are waxing old as a garment, and as 
a vesture the Lord shall fold them up. It is true that 
out of the old, new forms may be wrought by creative 
power ; but what our eyes behold, this fair earth with its 
sweet landscapes and glorious skies, its bright seasons 
and islands of delight, sun and moon and golden 
spheres, shall dissolve. Heaven and earth shall pass 
away, but the truths of God endure, the words of Christ 
shall not pass away. 

Christ's words are imperishable, from the nature of 
their source and character. It is not the letter, the 
printed symbol, or spoken sound, that has an eternity, 
but the spirit residing in the utterance, the verity of life 
that cannot perish. 

Whatever is deepest in its significance to the soul, 
that communicates meanings of heart to heart, that in- 
terprets life and helps it, partakes this gracious and 
enduring nature. There are words that cheer you, com- 
fort, inspire, yea^ add fresh grace to your existence. 
And why? Because they bear a message of hope or 
love, because they touch the undercurrents of being 
with a renewing power, because in them comes a strength 



WOI^DS. 173 



on which your own can cling or rise. Take your sin- 
cerest experience, when you have been invigorated, or 
refreshed, or consoled, and what a blessing have true, 
earnest, hearty words been to you. The sympathy that 
was breathed while you were smitten by that sorrow , the 
word of applause after that painful effort that you 
dreaded ; the assurance, while so many were suspicious, 
of a faithful soul that believed you true ; the encourage- 
ment of a friend, when }ou were most sadly disheart- 
ened, — how helpful were such expressions in your time 
of need ! Then, too, how you have been revived by the 
light flung out of magnetic souls in hours of their loftiest 
eloquence ; and how, from narrative and poem, from 
social converse and sweet song, has flowed into your 
being a refreshing stream replenishing diy places with 
the blossoms of delight. What helped you in that mood 
of discouragement, what quickened you in that hour of 
indecision, was the power of a life coming in contact 
with your own through the medium of words. A spark 
shot out of a true nature enkindled genial fires within. 
The fragrance of a sincere heart was shed upon your 
own. A keener eye than yours showed you what was 
hopeful through the gloom. An ear finer than yours 
interpreted the gracious words of a promise that made 
you glad. There was gathered in a capacious soul the 
dews of a benediction that, through loving lips, found 
way to your own. The words helped you, I say, 
strengthened, comforted, because they were in some 
sort a transmission of life. So it is that all the great 
sayings of the wise, the noble revelations of profound 



174 WHITS UN TIDE. 



affection, the utterances of saints and seers, charged 
with the experience of joy and sorrow, come to us with 
gifts of grace and power. He who moves us greatly is 
he who overflows with emotion. He who comes closest 
to us is he in whom we are conscious of profoundest 
recognitions and sympathies. There is no gratitude so 
deep as that born in the experience of a replenishment 
of the hidden life. All this, of course, suggests that 
words to be valuable must be expressions of truth of 
some kind that nourishes man, the immortal. There 
are shams of words, — the froth, the bubbles, the empti- 
ness, — that give us nothing, save perchance deception 
and imposition. So there are sayings that are frigid, 
chilling, and dead, and sayings that strike weakness to 
the heart instead of strength, that unnerve and blind and 
prostrate by their malign power. Of course, there is a 
variety of capacity and susceptibility to receive the ben- 
ediction or the curse ; but suspect that professed teacher 
of the deep things of life if you get no quickening from 
his speech, if he touches nothing in you that responds 
with an ache for the high and holy, and with joy in the 
hope of triumph. You have a right, if you are sincere 
in the struggle and aspiration for the good, to complain 
if no light breaks above you, and if you get no firmer 
hold on the royalties of God. 

Now what gives the words of our Lord Christ their 
enduring, inexhaustible fulness and grace is, that they 
are disclosures of the heavenly verities. They are the 
good news of God. They compass the sense of the 
divine good-will to us. In them infinite love prophesies 



WORDS. 175 



to man, pleads with man, unfolds to him the glorious 
arcana of the everlasting kingdom. They are rays of 
the spiritual sun, whose glory fills the heaven of heavens, 
and can never wane. They are the music of the eter- 
nal harmonies of God's providence and care and sover- 
eignty and unwasting grace. They are streams of the 
fountain in which life is cleansed, beatified, and satis- 
fied for ever. Because they are of God, the will and 
life and love of Him who made us for Himself, they 
cannot die, — spiritual, they belong to spirit, and divine, 
they pertain to the eternities. The simple fact that 
Christ Himself is most significantly named as the Word, 
shows the value and fulness of w^hat He disclosed to 
the world. It is true that His lile illustrated His doc- 
trine. He was Emmanuel. He showed in the most 
glorious manner the Saviour coming into communion 
with human hearts, consoling human sorrows, conquer- 
ing the dark evils in the paths of men, breathing His 
love and confidence and cheer evermore as He minis- 
tered, and dying at last for the salvation of the race. 
But suppose, with all His gracious charities and mighty 
works. His beautiful and perfect life and sacrificial 
death, He had proclaimed no divine message. Suppose 
He had told us nothing of the love of our Father in 
heaven, nothing of our holy human brotherhood, noth- 
ing of the object and possibilities of our being. Sup- 
pose He had brought no message that assures the weary 
heart of rest, and the sin-sick of health and joy ; that He 
had said nothing of the gifts of the Spirit, and nothing 



1 7 6 WHITS UN TIDE. 



of the many mansions of His glory ; that no word of a 
merciful providence had been spoken, no disclosure of 
the inner riches been made, no victory of the soul af- 
firmed, no sweet counsel been given to the penitent, and 
no consolation to the sorrowful. Suppose, in a word, 
that His sermon on the mount. His parables, His con- 
versations with His disciples, His warnings and invita- 
tions, had never been uttered and recorded, though He 
had Himself appeared, what precious, what incalculable 
treasures would be lost to us ! How destitute would 
the world be still of that light that is such a solace and 
a joy ! But, thank God, it is not for us to consider such 
a slate of spiritual poverty, except to heighten our grati- 
tude that our Lord's sayings are with us as true, as full, 
as rich, as inspiring, as when first pronounced. He 
could not be the Christ without these disclosures of 
the divine character and purpose and grace. He came 
that we might have life, and that we might have it 
more abundantly ; and He says. My words, they are 
spirit, they are life. And it is this very thing that 
makes them glorious, precious, enduring. They en- 
lighten the soul, feed it, inspire it with blessed hope, 
lead it to God. 

Strange as it may seem, there are some who try to 
discredit the wonderful disclosures of Christ as peculiar 
to Himself, who attribute to Buddha, Confucius, and 
Zoroaster, and other teachers of mankind, the light that 
beams from this Sun of righteousness. What advan- 
tage could be gained by such endeavor I fail to see. 



WORDS. 177 



For, allowing that every true and wise and benign word 
has a divine source, and that all who communicated 
meanings of God to the soul had a sacred ministry, it 
is still the plainest fact of history that never man spake 
as spoke the Christ. None, from the nature of their 
calling and place, could speak like Him, — for He was 
the divine Logos, the living Word, the perfect Teacher, 
God with us. The scattered rays of spiritual light that 
had flickered and glimmered here and there in former 
dispensations poured forth from Him in a supreme efful- 
gence. What was caught from ancient prophet and 
seer in mere glimpses, in Him had clear and ample 
unequivocal disclosure. He made known the will of 
God, so that all could see that it is good. He showed 
what was the end of being with unmistakable precision. 
He asserted the divine Fatherhood with a convincing 
authority. He held up the meanings of life in the radi- 
ance of God's love, so that hope and peace could spring 
in the dreariest bosom. The spurious things, the base 
things, frauds and shams and corruptions, had their dis- 
guises smitten off and their meanness and foulness 
made manifest by His terrible and majestic truthful- 
ness. His words searched the hearts of men. They 
sifted souls. They brought the benediction of a love 
unfailing and everlasting in the heavens. They begot 
sweet confidences, and charmed holy hopes and affec- 
tions, and interpreted the symbols of a benignant nature, 
and flushed the eternities with tender light. The way 
of escape out of sin's infirmity and bondage and death, 
8* L 



178 WHITS UN TIDE. 



into the strength and freedom and life of God, — this 
was the message and the gift, and all help and sympa- 
thies that are connected with so complete a gospel. It 
is true that some did not choose to hear, did not seem to 
wish to understand. It is true that these words of life 
seemed spoken to some in vain. How far it was so we 
cannot know ; but with such variety of spiritual capacity, 
some, it must be confessed, of a very low range, it is not 
to be wondered at that some heeded not the heavenly 
teachings, and were deaf to the truths of life. It is not 
to be wondered at, I say, for you know there is barren 
soil, the rock on which the seed cannot root itself and 
grow. You have seen people rise and leave the assem- 
bly during the utterance of periods of rare and thrilling 
eloquence. You have seen people chatter and flirt 
while poetry was spoken that was sweet enough to stop 
an angel's flight, or while music was warbling that shook 
the very dews of celestial flowers into your soul. Some 
hear not, and believe not, for they are shut up in an in- 
sensibility that hinders perception and faith. It was so 
when our Lord first taught in His native land, and it is 
so still. Pride and conceit and selfishness and lust 
and sin stop the ears of the soul. But, however this 
may be, the sayings of Jesus keep their divine and im- 
perishable fulness. Yea, as time passes on, as the 
experience of humanity becomes more peculiar and 
varied, as the range of human need and possibility 
seems more vast and sublime, these words of Christ 
seem to unfold grander, seem more charged with the 



IVOI^DS. 179 



life divine. There are sayings which are helpful at the 
time, good and acceptable at the juncture when uttered, 
but which, under other circumstances and relations, have 
no powerful application. But the Lord's words take on, 
if possible, larger meanings with the centuries and the 
higher achievements of the race. Instead of wearing 
out, they ripen into more wonderful blossoms of wisdom 
and truth. The divine element in them fits them for 
every age, every clime, every race, every individual, 
every experience ; and, after epochs of change and con- 
vulsion, they come as fresh to the heart, as marvellous 
in their inspirations and disclosures, as when first spo- 
ken. And this miracle of their power in making God 
known to the creature, in shedding light on human ways 
and its mystery, of lifting the soul to the uses and the 
blessedness designed by infinite love, is the pledge of 
their immortality. You find them, dear friends, meeting 
your case as if only meant for you, bearing their balm 
and benediction to your hearts as generously as to those 
who have passed upward to their rest, sending on your 
hopes to everlasting habitations, and nerving your 
strength for a more arduous conflict with sin. This 
glorious gospel comes to you with the same cheer and 
consolation as it did to the disciples that gathered in 
upper chambers and in lonely places to hear its message 
from Paul and John and Polycarp and Ignatius. The 
weary and sin-sick find it as precious, the aspiring, 
as full of promise. Yes, it seems the larger becomes 
the spiritual capacity, the more wonderful shine its 



l8o WHITSUNTIDE. 



meanings. Say what they may about the marvellous 
works of the Lord, men have to confess that His say- 
ings seem grander and grander, and sweeter and richer, 
as the ages advance and the conditions of our humanity 
are more varied and peculiar. Time cannot wear them 
out. They are the abiding testimonies of the divine 
charity. They are the perennial streams of enlighten- 
ment and love. What is written on marble or brass is 
effaced at last, but that which is assimilated in the spir- 
itual nature lives on, reproducing its loveliness and 
power. These sayings of Christ are lodged in souls that 
have found God in their possession. They fructify in 
lives that grow beautiful in the divine companionship. 
They speak in the hosannas of the glorified. They en- 
dure in the joys of hearts that ripen in celestial grace 
and knowledge. No decay can touch them, for, spirit- 
ual, they inhere in the spiritual kingdom. So, though 
the solid globe and its fair scenes fade and perish, 
though over realms now radiant and musical shall brood 
the silence of death, though the stars go out from the 
blue heavens and morning comes no more over the 
sweet valleys and the clear waters that embellish our 
globe, yea, though the majestic universe be resolved to 
chaos again, the blessed words of the Lord endure. But 
suppose you have not received them, loved them, lived 
by them, what, then, amid a dissolving world, a flaming 
firmament, while the vanities of time shrivel up and 
vanish ? What, then t Unless you have His word, you 
have no life in you, no blessed, glad, heavenly life. 



WORDS. i8i 



How, then, shall you survey the funeral of the globe, 
destitute of His word ? Wliat shall be your end ? 
What your hope? Where your refuge? Ah, where 
your home ? What, then, to the believer, to those in 
whom His word has wrought with power ? What but 
His own approval, His own likeness, and His own 
everlasting joy. 



AFTER TRINITY. 



'^ We look not at the things which are seen^ but at the 
thiitgs which are not seen : for the things which are 
seen are temporal ; but the thi7tgs which are not seen 
are eternal^ — 2 Corinthians iv. 18. 



XVII. 

THE TEMPORAL AND THE ETERNAL. 

A NY one who takes notice of his higher experience 
knows that he has reference often to what does 
not belong strictly to the world of sense and time. He 
finds himself influenced more or less by what he does 
not see with the bodily vision, and what does not come 
within the domain of the material. He is so constituted, 
his nature is made up of such elements, that he inevi- 
tably has to do in thought and feeling with a world that 
is above the one that meets his common gaze. He 
looks at things that are not seen ; that is, he is convinced 
of realities that lie beyond the tangible ; he thinks of 
what is not disclosed to sense ; he acts with reference to 
verities that do not belong to physical existence ; he is 
drawn w^onderfully sometimes toward a world which is 
only discovered by the soul. This is one of the great 
and significant facts of our strange being, this instinc- 
tive disposition to look outward and upward ; and I 
wish to use the fact as an evidence of the soul's creation 
for a divine and infinite existence. However large and 
glorious the visible universe may be, however varied its 
objects and aspects, or however much we may be aston- 



1 36 AFTER TRINITY. 



ished and delighted and awed by its phenomena, we 
are never satisfied to limit our observation to it entirely. 
Thought is constantly going beyond the outward, the 
material, to something above, to something still unseen. 
The child who is just becoming conscious of thought 
does not rest in a view of what appears to sight. He 
looks at the sky, for instance, which, of course, seems a 
material concave. But his thought does not stop there : 
it goes beyond it. He thinks of the possibility of sepa- 
rating the veil, and of the regions that are farther on, 
and what might reward the traveller could he but fly 
away. The darkness to him does not merely conceal 
the objects that the light reveals ; but it is peopled with 
shapes new and strange, and different from those that 
he beholds with the natural eye. He looks into the 
waters, into the solemn woods, into the weird and many- 
colored clouds, and nowhere does his mind stop with the 
physical appearance. Something rises out of the watery 
depths, something flits away among the rocks and trees, 
something peers out from the edges of the fantastic 
clouds, something hides in the shadow of the great 
mountain, something wantons in the spray of the cata- 
ract, something whispers and sings and sighs in the 
evening wind and among the dark pines and along the 
melancholy shore, — something that is not the same as 
pertains to the familiar w^orld about him. To say that 
all this is the child's fancy, which larger knowledge and 
experience dispel, does not impair in the least the sig- 
nificance of the experience, as illustrating the tendency 
of the soul. Knowledge and experience change one's 



THE TEMPORAL AND THE ETERNAL. 187 

notions of the invisible world, but do not change the 
confession of the soul to its existence. The child, in his 
Teachings forth for the bright pictures that he sees beyond 
the sky, or for the beings that seem to dance in the 
snow-flakes and talk in the autumn winds, is only ex- 
ercising the nature that the man on a larger scale exer- 
cises in the hungerings of a heart that in peril and 
disaster would rest on the Infinite, and be satisfied. 

What is true of the child, as he begins to look out on 
life and this wonderful world, is true of all nations in 
their infancy. They acknowledge a power outside the 
visible creation. They show by religious observance, 
by confessions of worship and scrupulous compliance 
with a ritual, that there is more that concerns them than 
what they see with their mortal eyes. This deference 
to signs and seasons, the sacrificing and the supplica- 
tions, all the manifold puerilities of a narrow intelli- 
gence and gross ignorance, may betoken the most 
lamentable superstition ; but this does not destroy the 
fact of the tendency of the soul toward the invisible, 
the effort to get light beyond what is seen, the cry of 
the human for guidance and comfort and happiness and 
rest. The besotted savage that bows before a snake, 
or that beats the hollow drum to frighten away the 
spirits of the air, or who brings cakes and fruits to his 
idol, is connecting his service with a world beyond the 
visible as well as the philosophic sage who regards this 
great universe only as the thought of God expressed. 
Only the former sees but a little way with a dim and 
confused vision whose inferences are false and foolish. 



1 88 AFTER TRINITY. 

All the religious rites and services of heathendom are 
the expression cf this yearning of the heart for the infi- 
nite, the divine, the everlasting. It is not with the form 
of this expression that we have now to do, but with the- 
state of being out of which the evidence is born, that is 
significant. The Christian invoking the heavenly Father, 
without a symbol to obstruct his spiritual vision, and the 
low African at his fetish w^orship, present vastly different 
objects, so far as the uses and ends cf being are con- 
cerned ; but they both illustrate the fact that the soul is 
always overflowing the limits of the visible, that it is 
looking beyond itself and the material screen that sur- 
rounds it. It has to confess its needs and aspirations, 
\vhether its language be the gibberish of the bushman 
or the eloquence cf Plato. What it uses to breathe its 
devotion, to tell its faith, to ensure its safety, to procure 
its happiness, is something that is shaped after the vision 
that it has of the awful, the unknown, the infinite, the 
beyond, when it looks with fear or vronder or hope or 
aspiration. The cannibal feasts of the Patagonians, 
the deathful procession of the Juggernaut, the contor- 
tions and agonies of the medicine-men cf the Kiowas, 
the incense that is burned before Josh temples or in 
Roman sanctuaries, the sacrifices that the savage offers 
in the wilderness and the sacred fire that is kept aglow 
on Persian altars, the penances of the ascetic and the 
prayers of the saint, profoundly understood, — tell the 
same stor}^ of a soul that thinks of more than it can dis- 
cover, that reaches beyond what shuts in its material 
vision, that acknowledges a power above the visible and 



THE TEMPORAL AND THE ETERNAL. 189 

perishing. This is very different from saying that the 
methods used are equally advantageous to secure its end. 
They are not. But yet in all these ways the soul makes 
its confession ; it tells its story of want and weakness, 
and sin and sorrow, and cries for help and guidance 
and salvation. 

And this is true whether one have any professed sym- 
pathy or relation with those who show unmistakably 
their religious beliefs and concern. It is a fact of expe- 
rience ; and I do not hesitate to affirm that every life, 
however illiterate or cultivated, gives evidence of it. It 
is not merely the untaught peasant who betrays his 
feeling for a spiritual world, as in the gusty night, wdth 
an uncertain sky and a moaning wind, he hurries past 
the place of graves, where the white tombstones lean 
amid the rustling w-eeds and the moonlight falls fitfully 
on the dreary mounds ; nor the ignorant fisherman, who 
scuds with a shuddering awe along the shore where the 
pirate craft was wrecked, and where the legend tells of 
the souls that will not sleep after their deeds of avarice 
and blood. You and I have this sensibility to the aw- 
ful fact of God. You may laugh at the absurdities of 
the superstitious, and even think from week to week 
that you have strength and wisdom to stand alone with- 
out a divine friendship ; but have you, too, not confessed, 
out of the far soundings of a soul that is God-given, that 
you looked at the unseen with eyes of astonishment and 
fear and thankfulness and desire. Is there no space of 
your life that is illumined by a light shining in from the 



AFTER TRINITY. 



infinite, or vocal with voices that tell of your confidence 
in the unseen and everlasting ? In your sincerest 
moments, whatever your usual frame of thought and 
life, you did not glory in your own resources, nor think 
that the visible and earthy was all that could meet your 
need. Perhaps you had wandered alone to some region 
remote from human dwellings, some mountain-top, where 
was spread beneath the vast panorama of a glorious 
landscape, and above, the clear depths of the cerulean 
sky ; and, looking over the encircling scene, taking 
into your thought the valleys and the hills, the homes 
of the happy and the sorrowful, all the beauty in tint 
and tone, the grandeur and the glory coming down 
from the sky and throned in the majestic heights, you 
have seen beyond all. Your heart did not and could 
not rest in these glories of earth and heaven, — it went 
beyond them, farther on, and higher ; and, as the solemn 
peace of the everlasting hills fell upon you, and the splen- 
dor of light and color shone into your heart, and the sense 
of the awfulness of life entered your soul, you seemed to 
gather an influence from beyond the glory around. You 
did not seem alone. You did not feel or believe that the 
visible was all, for something within you said " God," and 
asked for a portion of the inheritance that stretched away 
fadeless and sweet beyond the limits of sense and time. 
Or you may have been on the great deep, drifting and 
drifting as into infinite fields, with no sight of succor or 
rescue, or been smitten there by a fierce cyclone that 
tore into spray the huge billows and flung the ship shud- 



THE TEMPORAL AND THE ETERNAL, 191 

dering and convulsed into the hollow sea ; and while 
night settled around your barque with a terrific gloom, 
illumined only by the lurid lightning, and the great waves 
went overhead as if sweeping to certain doom the ves- 
sel and her treasures, and all faces gathered despair in 
the hour that you thought would be your last, then, in 
the might and majesty of the storm and the desolation 
of the scourged and shivering seas, you looked out on 
what was mightier, you had a feeling of the invisible, 
you fain would take hold of God, for you confessed that 
there was safety and help in Him alone. So, too, if you 
have stood where the earth shook and cracked under 
the tread of the earthquake, or where the air was thick 
with the ashes of the volcano ; or, if awakened from 
sleep by the cry of fire on the steamer, you have been 
swept on by the terror-stricken company to the vessel's 
side, not knowing w^hither to turn or what to do in the 
fearful extremity, then you have involuntarily thought of 
One who alone could save, who was above the earth and 
the fire and the storm. 

But not merely in these great displays of power is the 
confession of the soul wrung out. It is made in every 
great crisis of life, when you have felt the deepest pangs 
of love and fear, or the deepest gratitude and bliss. 
When all your happiness seemed to hang on a single 
thread, just ready to break ; when the breath of one 
dearest of all was ebbing away, and you, too, seemed 
borne out upon the dark eternity afar; when, after anguish 
and agony, there flowed into your soul a sweet and ten- 



192 AFTER TRINITY. 



der joy ; when strange terror came to you, or stranger 
rescue ; when after a surfeit of pleasure you loathed your 
sin with an inexpressible disgust, or when hurt by cruel 
tongues, and seized by the vice-like grip of wrong, — then 
you know how it was not with the visible that you held 
communion. You reached away for the good that is eter- 
nal in its infinite repose. Your heart ran out to One who 
holds the generations and ages in His hands. It was God 
that you acknowledged. It was God you wanted, that you 
praised, that you sought or feared or thirsted for, in 
your creature w^eakness and sin. I say God ; for there 
is no other name for what can satisfy you in your great 
sense of need or danger or gratitude or love. Whether 
you clearly recognized the divine attributes at the time 
of your greatest solicitude and at the sharpest crisis of 
your life or not, does not invalidate the meaning of your 
experience. You considered what was unseen. You 
yearned for the all-good. You inquired after the eter- 
nal refuge and the quenchless light. You wanted a 
solid foundation on which to stand, and a security that 
danger and wrong could not invade. It was a heart 
that was infinitely true and tender that you desired to 
take you to itself, and a justice sure and infallible and 
supreme that you asked for your vindication. The 
sight of your soul went further than man and his doings, 
or earth and its glories, or time and its decays. For 
you knew that man dies, and his power and pomp van- 
ish ; and you knew that dead matter, though its forms 
seem imperishable, could not give you sympathy or aid 



THE TEMPORAL AND THE ETERNAL. 193 

in the high and in the deep places of the soul. ' The in- 
visible that you regarded was the reality of a divine one, 
of the Divine One, good and holy and almighty, from 
everlasting to everlasting. It was really God that you 
acknowledged, though you have not tried to honor Him ; 
God that you wanted, though you have not accepted His 
gracious gift; God that you clung to for a moment, 
though you relapsed into indifference and unbelief. 
Whenever you have come close to the deepest realities 
of life, or groped hungry and thirsty in the awful mys- 
tery of existence, or asked out of aching and tears for a 
perfect rest and peace, you have confessed your want of 
God. But vague and dim has your sight been even 
when you felt most the awfulness of things, and pined 
most bitterly for peace. In the boundless immensity 
of the invisible, who could point out God, could lead 
you to Him, could give voice to His love, could give 
confidence and sure interpretations. Ah, you could feel 
the need of infinite succor, the desirableness of almighty 
sympathy, the beauty of a life cleansed and sweetened 
and saved ; but how come to the invisible One in whose 
hands all the heavens and the constellations are as the 
motes in the flooding sunshine. It is just here that 
come in the grace and glory and abundant fulness 
of the gospel. It is here that appear the fitness and 
meetness of the gracious provisions of redemption. 
In these last days God has spoken by His Son, whom 
He has appointed heir of all things; who was the 
brightness of His glory and the express image of His 
9 M 



194 



AFTER TRINITY. 



person. He has declared the Father's will. He has 
illustrated the Father's love. He has made atonement 
for sin. He has brought life and immortality to light. 
What we most need to know of God He has revealed 
in His gracious teachings and mighty works, His cross 
and passion, His sacrificial death and glorious resur- 
rection. Jesus Christ has revealed the Father. In 
your sense of sin and sorrow, of perplexity and infirmity, 
of ignorance and spiritual want, you have not to look 
beyond time and sense to a vague infinity where there 
is no heart, no sympathy, no love, no supreme wisdom 
and almighty benignity, — where you are lost in an aw- 
ful sense of your littleness and unworthiness and help- 
lessness ; but you can see the divine tenderness and 
grace and power in Him who is touched with a feeling 
of your infirmities, who is to you elder brother, friend, 
redeemer, the bread from heaven, the water of life, the 
way to God, — yea, the Lamb of God, that taketh away 
the sin of the world. 

And will you not be constrained by such love as He 
displayed to come to Him and live His life ? Is the cry 
of your own heart nothing ? Is the gift of this Son of 
God nothing.^ Oh, you who believe know that it is 
every thing ; you know that if they take this Jesus away, 
you lose your path, you perish from hunger, the light 
goes out in the heavenly places, the awful immensity of 
the invisible is dark ! You are a child crying in the 
night, with none to answer you and none to fold you in 
the arms of an everlasting peace. Oh, I beseech you 



THE TEMPORAL AND THE ETERNAL, 195 

who desire peace and purity, who thirst for the water 
that refreshes the soul, who would know God and the 
fruitions of eternity, to accept this Jesus as your life 
and light, and through Him learn the secret of the 
heavenly kingdom, — the knowledge of the invisible 
God! 



^^The Son of man is come eating and drinking; and ye 
say^ Behold a gluttonous man, and a wine-bibber, a 
friend of publicans and si?tners I " — Luke vii. 34. 



XVIII. 

CHRIST'S REVERENCE FOR THE HUMAN SOUL. 

TT is one of the most precious facts of the gospel that 
Christ's birth and career in time were in the natural 
order of our humanity. Infancy, with its appealing 
helplessness and winsome beaut}'', was His. Childhood, 
with its gleesome ways, its little wonderments, and inno- 
cent pleasures. Youth, with its eager curiosity, its vague 
aspirations, its glowing susceptibilities ; and then the 
laborious period of early manhood, at His dwelling in 
Nazareth. All His early experience. His home culture, 
His youthful inquisitiveness. His lonely converse with 
solemn and majestic nature. His toils and self-restraint 
in the midst of evil which He would fain assault, were 
the needed preliminaries to the mighty work of the 
world's redemption. Through all this space of growing 
sensibility, of deeper insight into life, of profounder 
consciousness of power, of patient waiting, of knowledge 
gained and self mastered. He was brought into the closest 
possible intimacy with the humanity that He came to 
save. No element of experience was wanting for the 
adequate fulfilment of His ministry when the hour came 
tliat He was summoned forth. And from His inaugura- 
tion at His baptism to the night of His betrayal, it is 



198 AFTER TRINITY. 



noticed how close was His contact with men, how little 
He withdrew Himself from their company save for pur- 
poses of devotion, and with what an inexpressible sym- 
pathy He seemed bound to each individual soul. Those 
who judged man from his externals, his social or offi- 
cial position, would greatly misinterpret the meaning of 
Christ's conduct and life. It was the sneer of the Phari- 
sees that His presence among the depraved was the sign 
of His own unworthiness. Ah, had He been otherwise 
than He was in the infinite sympathy of a heart that 
appreciated all that was in man, we could not recognize 
the Saviour that we long for and love. " Behold a glut- 
tonous man, and a wine-bibber, a friend of publicans 
and sinners ! '^ say those who judge from the mere out- 
ward. My Lord and my God ! exclaims the heart that 
beholds Him in His spirit overflowing with grace and 
love. 

Two very significant facts strike us in the most cur- 
sory study of the history of Christ : one is His unin- 
terrupted and constant devotion to man, irrespective of 
His character or condition ; and the other, the wonderful 
way in which all sincere natures were drawn to Him. 
If we seek to give a name to the fact out of which this 
grew, it will be best stated in His reverence for the human 
soul. This involves no countenance to sin, no palliation 
of wrong-doing. It grows from an appreciation of all that 
is affecting and august in man's relationships, his origi- 
nal gifts, his possibilities, the sacredness of his person- 
ality as a child of God. In our haste or blindness we 
are apt to approve or disprove the whole man. We are 



CHRIST'S REVERENCE FOR THE SOUL. 199 

repelled or attracted by the person. We judge by some 
feature of character which we like or dislike. Christ 
saw with pure eyes the immortal part, the lineaments of 
the original creation, the glorious germ of angelic beauty 
and power. This human nature might be tainted, dis- 
ordered, in ruins, still there was something left that told 
of a divine origin and glorious use, and beatific exalta- 
tion. Away back, if you please, in its remote depths, 
broken, discolored, trampled upon, concealed almost, 
were the remains of that nature imparted by the breath 
of God. Where there exists still a single sensibility 
that responds to kindness, where lingers a single affect- 
ing memory, where a gleam of something better than 
sin touches its desire and hope, there is something 
sacred. Christ saw and appreciated the essential 
soul. All that was human touched Him. He could 
not look upon that nature with its loves and hopes, its 
faded visions and its eager aspirations, its griefs and 
joys, its capacity for truth and holiness, without abiding 
interest and respect. Such an existence, so wonderfully 
gifted and peculiarly set in this strange universe, was not 
to be treated lightly. There was that in these troubled, 
desponding, anxious hearts, even if weak and sinful, of 
amazing significance and preciousness. He looked in 
reverence upon it. So in all His ministry, however 
affronted or beset He might be, you never see an act 
that shows disrespect for the soul. He goes into hum- 
ble abodes as willingly as to the homes of the opulent. 
He treats the miserable leper as graciously as the cour- 
teous nobleman. He is as tender with the erring woman 



200. AFTER TRINITY, 



as with His own mother. Peasant and pharisee, the 
poor publican and the upright Nicodemus, the beggar 
at the gate of Jericho and the beloved John, received 
the same generous recognition. 

Our respect is too generally based upon the accidents 
of the individual life, and not its essentials. By many, 
how little comparatively is thought or seen of the soul 
that makes the life-drama possible, — the inner strug- 
gles, the love of the good that was not gained, the blight 
that smote heart and hope till the color faded out of life, 
the capacity still to love and trust, the longing for free- 
dom and purity and peace, — how little in ordinary 
measurements of men is appreciated the influences that 
have chilled generous affection and blasted joys long 
in gathering, all the tenderness and desire hid in depths 
that are now- congealed. Christ saw all ; and because 
the soul was the theatre of such solemn transactions, it 
had a fearful and tremendous interest. It might be 
allied to brilliant understandings or to narrow intellects, 
be incarnated in forms of wonderful beauty or of repul- 
sive exterior, be set in obscure or lofty walks : it was still 
a human soul, a jewel of God, an existence born for 
sublime and heavenly destinies. 

But Christ did not regard the soul, however affecting 
in its nature and experience, simply as it was in its low 
estate and disordered powers. He saw it in the light of 
its amazing possibilities, the glory of a perfected human- 
ity. How often do we forget that man the sinner is the 
faded, blotched, corroded canvas of the splendid picture 
whose immortal colors shall glow intenser in the radi- 



CHRIST'S REVERENCE FOR THE SOUL, 20I 

ance of eternity. Something unlovely, repulsive, base, 
we are quick to notice ; but of the majestic powers that 
may be evolved, the affections that may be purified and 
ripened by beatified companionships, his grand capac- 
ity for truth and beauty and joy, the glorious restoration 
possible in every attribute, till the whole man stands 
erect and symmetrical with everlasting joy upon his 
head, we think but little, as we contemplate the shat- 
tered, stained, suffering creature that is called man. 
But as the sculptor sees in the rough and weather- 
stained mass of marble the shape of beauty born in his 
creative thought, so did Christ behold in each soul the 
image of the glorious features of a humanity restored. 
That soul might now be poor and blind, crippled and 
sorrowful, its voices might be discords, it might grope in 
darkness and sin, but He saw it rich with affluent loves, 
clear-visioned amid the eternal light, its powers emanci- 
pated, its movement in the heavenly harmony, and its 
face lifted in the triumph of its great knowledge before 
the throne of God. Could He treat the creature within 
the limit of such a possibility with aught but tender 
regard ? Seeing humanity thus, could He despise any 
because of mental imperfections and moral poverty? 
Could He spurn any, however sinful, or discourage any 
from the entertainment of a better hope, however bitter 
their experience and dark their way ? 

This feeling of reverence in Christ explains His infi- 
nite tenderness and patience and trustfulness with man. 
So much was precious in the soul, so much that might 
be blighted and perverted by unkindness and neglect, 
9* 



2 02 AFTER TRINITY, 



SO much that needed counsel, sympathy, confidence, 
winning love, that He could not condemn harshly, could 
not refuse the mute appeal of suffering and temptation, 
could not dash out the little hope that flickered in the 
heart. So, in illustration, note how cordially He receives 
Zaccheus, who desired to see Him, how kindly He dis- 
missed the woman after her accusers departed ashamed 
and confounded from the temple, with what gentleness 
He rebuked Peter with a glance as He passed the Court 
of Pilate, with what marvellous self-abnegations He 
ministered to the hungry and diseased crowds that fol- 
lowed Him, and with what tender assurances He re- 
sponded to the penitent criminal that hung beside Him 
in the hour of His agony. Surely the bruised reed He 
would not break and the smoking flax He would not 
quench. What a commentary on our severity, hard- 
ness, unkindness. How prone we are to let one's errors 
or indiscretions hurry us to cruel judgments, and to hide 
the excellence of characters, which, in our passionate 
eyes, are blurred and stained. 

Then, too, His patience, — reaching on and on in its 
long-suffering amplitude, waiting and never weary, hope- 
ful and never despairing of conquering the soul, — no 
wonder the patience of Christ became an apostolic 
formulary of moral loveliness. What a power was in 
it! Here is a nature made suspicious by manifold 
deceits, stranded on the shoals of doubt and distrust, 
galled by unkindness, jaded by care, — unlovely, no 
doubt, desponding, obstinate, wedded to sin. Does the 
Master crush it by imperious authority, exasperate it by 



CHRIST'S REVERENCE FOR 'THE SOUL, 203 

taunts, fling it aside as a cumberer of the ground ? Ah, 
give it time to recover, opportunities to know itself ; 
nurse it by gentleness, gain its confidence, find the 
secret of its weakn'fess and sorrow. Do not despair. It 
may bear fruit next year. Oh, this infinite patience of 
Jesus, how it rebukes our cynical criticisms and pas- 
sionate haste, how it bids us take note of temperaments, 
troubles, habits, provocations, prejudices, in our judg- 
ments of men ! 

But Christ's reverence for the soul inspired a feeling 
of confidence in men, in their better selves, in their 
restoration from sin and error. It is one of the con- 
ceits of the worldly that they are deeply sagacious 
respecting the treatment of their fellows, — that it is 
unwise, weak, to put faith in man. The motto of the 
world is not "trust,'' but "suspicion." "Treat each 
man as a rogue, " it says, " until he proves that he is not." 
To a fresh, unsophisticated nature there is no experi- 
ence so keenly rasping as to find in its first dealings 
with men that its integrity and purity of intention are 
held in the gravest doubt, that its word is not believed. 
The effect of this is to produce suspicion. If you would 
make your children deceitful, convince them from their 
earliest years that you do not believe them. If you 
would cultivate dishonesty among those you employ, 
act as if, as a matter of course, you could not trust them. 
If you would aggravate any fault in those around you, 
treat them as criminals. A great deal that is reprehen- 
sible and demoralizing in society is the natural fruit of 
hard, cruel unbelief in man, of mean suspicions, of a 



204 AFTER TRINITY, 



prying, captious, vindictive spirit, a habit of driving back 
whatever is responsive to a noble magnanimity in the 
heart, instead of evoking and strengthening it. Christ 
trusted men. The closeness with which He came to 
them begot confidence whose fruit was holy. He won 
by His faith in the nature that He gave Himself to 
save, by a sympathy that took hold of the deep, hidden 
tendrils of the soul, which thus could climb up to purity 
and peace, on the strength of His mighty heart. The 
triumphs of the cross are all in this spirit of divine per- 
suasion. And here is our model. The wayward heart, 
the alienated affections, the evil life, cannot be reclaimed 
by reproaches, coldness, condemnation. Away down in 
the depths of the soul is a place that may be reached by 
sympathetic trust. Gain there an entrance, and you pre- 
pare the way for victory. 

But our fault is that we allow the slights and offences 
of our fellows to warp our views of humanity, if not to 
paralyze our interest in man simply as man. I know 
that some have such an experience of wrong as to af- 
ford, perhaps, a partial excuse for their social isolation 
and suspicions. They have been foully treated, and 
the iron has entered into their souls. But too often 
men become morose, cynical, misanthropic, because 
they have found a few deceitful and unkind. But 
stand off from your fellows in disdain or mistrust, and 
they will stand off from you. Christ maintained this 
unconquerable respect for the soul in the midst of all 
burdens, rebuffs from Pharisaic pride, in poverty, tempta- 
tion, loneliness, and pain. He never lost His patience 



CHRIST'S REVERENCE FOR THE SOUL. 205 

and tenderness and trustfulness, the outgrowths of 
His reverence for the soul. And this explains the rea- 
son of His power, — why men were so wonderfully 
drawn to Him, why the dejected in His presence could 
lay aside their burdens and the guilty see the hope of 
pardon, and life look fairer to the bereaved, and the 
horizon of the future widen and brighten to the hearts 
that ached and longed for rest. It was because He 
had in Himself a fulness that touched every soul, that 
souls found in Him strength and refreshment. Oh, amaz- 
ing depth of divine humanity ! Fountain of inexhaustible 
life ! Here it is all plain. Christ is patient with you, 
very tender, and trustful of your better self. If you can 
only comprehend that Saviour coming so near to you, 
so compassionate, so sympathetic, seeing so clearly be- 
yond all your foibles and follies, and in spite of your 
sins regarding your soul with such an interest ; if you 
could only see Him thus, and all with which this is con- 
nected ; His painful ministry, the agony of His pas- 
sion, the stained and torturing cross, the infinite sacrifice 
and glorious resurrection, — you would feel springing up 
in your soul a yearning for Him, a sense of gratitude, 
a shame for your baser self, a desire of His likeness, a 
certainty of His love, so you could climb up from your 
spiritual penury and sin and darkness to His arms, and, 
resting there in holy trust and blessed peace, say, *^ My 
Lord and my God." 



^^ And Joseph dreamed a dream, and he told it his 
brethren^ — Genesis xxxvii. 5. 



XIX. 

THE MIRACLE OF DREAMS. 

"V\7E speak of things as wonderful, after the manner 
they impress us ; so that which is a source of 
astonishment to one person, may produce no such emo- 
tion in another. Of course, in an absolute sense, one 
phenomenon of thought is as marvellous as another, 
for how we think at all is an inscrutable mystery. Still, 
in dreams, there is so much that apparently differs from 
the mental operations of our waking hours, that the ex- 
perience is often more remarkable and impressive. 

It is not my intention to deliver an essay merely on 
what is curious in the subject of dreaming. My object 
in what I shall say is to enhance our consciousness of 
the marvel of life, and its possibilities as illustrated by 
some of the wonderful phenomena of dreams ; and so 
it will be necessary to make some reference to their 
nature and peculiarities. What dreams are, all know 
by their own experience. It is generally believed, too, 
that by some a good deal of importance is attached to 
them. In the oldest books extant they are mentioned, 
and a supernatural origin generally ascribed to them. 
The Bible clearly shows this, as well as the poems of 
Homer. In the ancient Oriental courts of Babylon and 
Egypt it was customary for monarchs to have a class of 



2o8 AFTER TRINITY. 



persons about them whose business it was to interpret 
dreams, and this was an important office of state. The 
classics abound in evidences of the wide-spread faith 
in their spiritual nature. Grave philosophers have writ- 
ten treatises on their interpretation, as they did on 
astrology. A common way of consulting the Greek and 
Roman oracles was for the inquirer to sleep a night in 
the temple, after the due performance of religious rites, 
when his questions were supposed to be answered in 
dreams. That dreams should have a peculiar signifi- 
cance attached to them 43y the ignorant and unlettered 
is not to be wondered at, when we consider some of 
their extraordinary phenomena, and the proneness of 
the mind to be affected by what is marvellous. They 
often come without any logical connection with what is 
remembered. They produce impressions frequently 
deeper than any written or spoken thought. They 
are sometimes characterized by a clearness of vision 
and a definiteness of aim that give them a peculiar 
emphasis and influence. Often, we know, they are a 
vague jumble of notions, or an incoherent series of 
images, or a terrible sense of the awful and hideous, or 
a ludicrous picture of improbable situations and cir- 
cumstances, or a fantastic and vanishing display, in 
which we are alternately pleased and distressed. Then, 
again, they are signalized by the very highest operations 
of mind. For in dreams persons have found the clew 
to hidden paths of discovery, have solved the deepest 
problems, have composed admirable poems and music, 
have had what they accepted as providential warnings 



THE MIRACLE OF DREAMS. 209 

and prophetic helps to the life before them. All who 
have any knowledge of the subject are aware that the 
bodily condition and the previous mental state have a 
great deal to do with these experiences. A full meal 
before sleeping, a peculiar train of thought during the 
day, unusual joy or sorrow, any extraordinary sensa- 
tions, any strong excitement or solicitude, will be likely 
to shape and modify one's dreams. All of us have 
been the subject of states in sleep that surpass even 
the wildest imaginings of the day. We have seemed to 
struggle with the most terrible difficulties, to be plunged 
to the darkest abysses, and to be lifted to supreme 
heights of blessedness. We have sw^um through atmos- 
pheres of light and joy, have walked with tire absent 
amid distant yet familiar scenes, have rejoined the 
loved in the everlasting meadows of heaven, have been 
in the midst of demons and of angels, have been con- 
quered in aw^ul conflicts, and have come off victors our- 
selves ; have died, have risen to peace, and have had 
life set to all possible activities and employments, — 
indeed, there is nothing too fantastic or improbable in 
the range of our lives that we have not experienced or 
had glimpses of in dreams. 

A pertinent question is before us, and it is this : Are 
dreams of any more supernatural origin than the ordi- 
nary processes of the mind? Does any thing more 
divine pertain to them than to our normal daily thought ? 
In replying, I wdsh to affirm, first of all, that the inspira- 
tion of every good thought and right feeling is due to 
the Infinite Spirit that is the life of all. I hold that 



2IO AFTER TRINITY, 



evermore the gracious Light is streaming on us from 
above, that the gracious Voice is ever speaking to us, 
that the heart of Love is touching us with its tender and 
holy pulsations. But we are largely unprepared or un- 
willing to see, to hear, to receive the influxes of refresh- 
ing and purifying life. We cannot trace out the occult 
methods by which any wise and ennobling idea comes 
to us, or how any sweet and blessed impulse moves us. 
The process of all this is hidden. We simply know the 
facts of experience, or the order of sequence, which we 
call the law^s of our being. But the miracle of the 
generation of the thought we cannot explain. Now, as 
the operations of the mind go on, to a great extent at 
least, while we are in a state of sleep, the good influ- 
ences imparted in the process cannot of course be 
eliminated by the mere fact of the senses. Ordinarily 
our condition is such, in sleep, that we fail to remember 
our thoughts, or the impression is confused, and all the 
experience of the mind quite vague and indefinite. 
But again it is not so. There are attitudes of the soul 
in sleep where the good thought may be more powerful, 
and hence more inspiring and helpful, than when awake. 
For at such a time the mind may be so free from pre- 
occupation, so wonderfully unembarrassed by diverting 
influences, that its receptiveness shall be greatest, that 
it shall be best prepared to see clearest and to yield to 
the gracious persuasion. The very influences that in 
waking hours might have hindered the blessed impres- 
sion or the inspired thought may then be inoperative, 
so that what is peculiarly enlightening or gracious may 



THE MIRACLE OF DREAMS. 21 1 

reach and move it. You observe that I do not attribute 
this superior influence, whenever it may be experienced, 
to the mere article or fact of sleep, but to the favorable 
conditions for it. Whatever that is most wonderful in 
the impulses or apprehensions of the dreamer that have 
led to practical consequences, would have been realized 
when awake, if the soul and the surrounding world had 
been in just the same accord, if the individual's recep- 
tiveness had been the same. If there ever comes, then, 
in dreams a glimpse of what is higher than we are in our 
usual frame, a knowledge of what is deeper and more 
concealed, any light or help that is not vouchsafed while 
the senses are all awake, it is simply because there is 
just then a finer susceptibility, a more appropriate state, 
a more suitable medium, for such impressions and illu- 
mination. God is always coming to us in the various 
methods of His disclosures, speaking, instructing, guid- 
ing, helping on to a more excellent realization ; but we 
are a great deal of the time too indifferent or too 
stupid or too obstinate or too rebellious to receive and 
obey and understand. A little, of course, we gain and 
use for the higher life ; but how thick the veil seems to 
the most of us between the visible and the invisible, 
how dull we are to influences that come to us from the 
Infinite. The prophets of old heard the voice of God 
and saw His glory, because their natures were largely 
open to His light. 

My chief reason for calling your attention to the 
wonder of dreams is in the very remarkable and power- 
ful illustration they give of the possibilities of our being 



212 AFTER TRINITY. 



under conditions that may be deemed reasonable in 
some future state. The dream, while it continues, is 
unquestionably a real experience. If one should con- 
tinue to dream, the state, to all intents, would be as 
actual as any other. Now we know that the conscious- 
ness to which we give the name of dream is occasioned 
and modified largely by the pecuUarity of the sleeper's 
sensations at the time. Dr. Gregory relates that, having 
occasion to apply a bottle of hot water to his feet at 
bedtime, he dreamed that he was treading the hot soil of 
Mount Etna; and w^hen Dr. Reid once applied a blister 
to his head, he dreamed that he was scalped by Indians. 
These illustrations might be indefinitely extended, but 
almost every one can corroborate the fact affirmed by 
reference to some marked experience of his own, of 
a similar kind. By affecting, therefore, the organs of 
sense, or any of the vitalities of our being, so that the 
mind is reached, there may be produced impressions 
in sleep of the most significant character. Now it 
is with joy and suffering that we are most concerned, 
and which in some way comprise wdiat is most im- 
portant to us in life. But dreams show a wonderful 
scope, a prodigious capacity of our nature for such 
experiences. There have been opened to the sleeper 
elysiums of transcendent happiness. He has floated in 
atmospheres of joy. He has been touched by harmo- 
nies more exquisite, been thrilled with utterances more 
sublime, been tranced in ecstasies more supernal, been 
dazzled with glories more sweet and ravishing, than any 
that ever signalized his waking state. In fact, he has 



THE MIRACLE OF DREAMS. 213 

been more profoundly convinced of the possibility of a 
rarer and deeper enjoyment than any yet realized by some 
wonderful dream, than by any other influence. He may 
not be able to define the quality of the good that he 
had a glimpse of in sleep, nor give a name to the dis- 
closure, nor impart to a listener the consciousness that 
he had of the life of love, but the glorious impression was 
strongly made. It told what was possible within the 
limits of our existence under other and suitable condi- 
tions. And so with the opposite impression of suffer- 
ing. Who has not at some time, while in slumber, had 
an indescribable sense of horror most intolerable and 
everwhelming, — something that has no apparent anal- 
ogy to any ordinary pain or dread, but is of a kind by 
itself in its suggestions of supernatural agony. De 
Quincey describes some of his hallucinations under the 
influence of opium, and among other things says : " I 
fled from the wrath of Brahma through all the forests 
of Asia. Vishnu hated me, Siva lay in wait for me. 
I came suddenly upon Isis and Osiris. I had done a 
deed, they said, at which the ibis and the crocodile 
trembled. I was buried for a thousand years in stone 
coffins with mummies and sphinxes, in narrow chambers 
at the heart of eternal pyramids. I was kissed by can- 
cerous kisses by crocodiles, and lay confounded with 
unutterable slimy things among reeds and Nilotic mud.'' 
Sometimes the sufferer is clearly conscious of the 
scenery, personages, and events, through whose terrible 
panorama comes his sense of woe, — every thing is 
sharply defined in the vision of the soul. But, again, 



214 AFTER TRINITY. 



he is the subject of mere sensations of dread that pierce 
even to the marrow of his bones ; great, black, unde- 
fined, gigantic loads of misery seem pressing him down ; 
strange, subtle, brutal, demoniac influences seem to 
have him in their control ; he is stifled by a breath 
more leprous and infernal than any conception that he 
imagines of disgust. The very horror of the experience 
rouses him, and he is never so thankful as when he 
knows it is all a dream. And yet there is most solemn 
meaning in all this, whether it be of pain or pleasure to 
the sleeper, who perchance soon forgets the impression 
that for a while was so powerful and thrilling. We are 
forced to allow, by considerations like these, that our 
capacity for enjoyment or suffering is tremendous, and 
far beyond any thing that may be inferred from the 
usual phenomena of our experience. We see that there 
are possibilities that we have not yet fathomed in our 
actual being, but which may be as natural as any of the 
ordinary operations of our lives. Now while we remem- 
ber, as we have seen, that the phenomena of dreams 
are modified by whatever affects the senses or touches 
the springs of feeling and thought, we can easily con- 
ceive of a state of being where just those influences 
most powerful to excite joy or suffering may prevail. 
There is no more reason to reject such a view than to 
. reject the ordinary facts that are observed in common 
human life. In the future world, if the conditions of 
the soul are suitable, it will be just as natural for its 
happiness to rise to an indescribable fulness as it is 
for the flower to blossom or the water to run. And the 



THE MIRACLE OF DREAMS. 215 

same may be said of the experience of suffering. That 
nameless horror which agonized your sleep may have 
its actual counterpart in the soul of the wicked, that has 
madly flung away and trampled upon its talent for God 
and His righteousness. 

But this view of what the human soul has capacity 
for, as indicated by dreams, has powerful emphasis in 
another phenomenon of their appearance. I refer to 
the astonishing rapidity of the operation of the mind 
during certain states of slumber, — a rapidity which 
would seem incredible w^ere it not attested by the most 
indisputable evidence. De Quincey declares that he 
sometimes seemed to live seventy or one hundred years 
in a single night. " A person who was suddenly aroused 
from sleep by a few drops of water sprinkled in his face 
dreamed of the events of an entire life, in which happi- 
ness and sorrow were mingled, and which terminated 
finally in an altercation upon the border of a lake, into 
which his exasperated companion, after a considerable 
struggle, succeeded in plunging him." The whole 
dream could have lasted but a few seconds. Dr. Aber- 
crombie tells of a case, which is often quoted, of a man 
who dreamed that he had enlisted as a soldier, joined 
his regiment, was apprehended, carried back, tried, con- 
demned to be shot, and at last was led out to execution. 
After the usual preparations a gun was fired, and he 
awoke with the report to find out that the cause of his 
disturbance was a noise in an adjoining room. In a 
brief space, less than it takes to describe it, this long 
series of events had passed through the mind. Writers 



2l6 AFTER TRINITY. 



on mental phenomena give many interesting instances 
of tlie same kind. A similiar activity of the mind is 
noticed in the case of some while falling from high alti- 
tudes, or while passing through all the sensations of 
drowning. This amazing swiftness of -the mental opera- 
tions, therefore, under suitable influences, suggests ex- 
periences of the soul in another state of being, of the 
most impressive character. As we think of its career, 
with all its faculties unembarrassed, acting with their 
fullest capacity, where all is favorable for their most 
perfect movement, we are awed at the contemplation. 
For what volumes of strange and rich experience may 
it gather into itself in brief periods ! What depths of 
knowledge may it penetrate at a glance ! What areas 
of royal ownership, illimitable and splendid, may it 
sweep over in the realization of its immortality ! With 
what a tenacity may it hold the wonders of the heavenly 
universe as they unroll ! How the living links of its 
memory may be brightened and welded, until every 
sweet of its long past shall pour out its nectar, and 
every blossom of beauty that has adorned it shall 
shed again and again its exquisite fragrance ! Con- 
sidering the celerity of its thought, the power of its ap- 
prehension, the sagacity of its endeavor, the spontaneity 
of its loyalty to its light and privilege, with its life and 
movement in God, the imagination flags at a sight of 
its possession, and joys in eternity. But the same fact 
which suggests such probabilities of blessedness also 
warns us of the possibilities of woe. If the pure soul 
may have a fruition so wonderful in the career of its 



THE MIRACLE OF DREAMS. 217 

glorification, the godless one may have a corresponding 
intensity of misery. For we have only to think of the foul 
and perverted nature, with its faculties preternaturally 
alive, with all its swiftness and power of perception and 
memory, beholding its loss and shame and discords, its 
departure from divine order, its rejection of love and 
truth and Christ, to have a picture of wretchedness 
from which we may turn away appalled. And yet 
reason and the nature of things demonstrate that a 
horror is possible in the rage and madness and cor- 
ruption of the wicked, equal to the actualization of 
that which is hinted to us in the terror and mystery of 
dreams. 

I might illustrate the topic still further in this direc- 
tion by reference to the extraordinary imagination and 
logical power of the mind sometimes manifested in 
dreams, and a kind of prophetic sight that has at times 
momentarily characterized it. Condorcet, for instance, 
found in sleep the steps of a difficult calculation that 
he could not achieve during the day. I have heard 
persons relate similar facts. The wife of Julius Caesar, 
the night before his assassination, dreamed that he fell 
bleeding across her knees. Almost every one's mem- 
ory serves him here. My only sister, living in Maine, 
dreamed of my mother's fatal sickness and its peculiar- 
ities, when it came upon her last fall, and wrote a letter 
about it to express her solicitude, before she heard a 
word of the news that summoned us to the chamber of 
death. The use I make of such facts is to show again 
the possible achievements of the soul, its power of com- 
10 



2l8 AFTER TRINITY, 



municating at a distance without the usual medium, its 
marvellous insight, the scope and capacity of its under- 
standing, when a sufficient degree of perfection has 
been attained. But I have said enough to impress the 
main idea of my discourse. We are to live with eter- 
nity in view. 

No thoughtful or serious person can regard any phase 
of life without a sense of the awfulness of its conse- 
quences, and something instructive and deeply sug- 
gestive we are taught by the wonder of dreams. The 
law of our being continues, whatever we ignore or notice, 
whether we attach a meaning to one particular mani- 
festation of it or to another. We may never fully know 
ourselves. Yet were sin entirely absent from us, were 
body and soul both in absolute health, then would the 
operations and direction of life be right and its func- 
tions be supremely blessed. It is in the right use of 
our being, in the harmony and methods of God, that our 
glorification is secured. And into this harmony, where 
thought and impulse and action are in accord with the 
infinite wisdom and love, God is ever seeking to draw 
us. The gospel is a just and sublime attestation of His 
gracious will. Christ exemplifies for all mankind and 
for all ages the way and the truth and the life. And if 
we would discover the graciousness of our heavenly 
Father, the great meanings of life, whatever can en- 
lighten and inspire us so that we secure a sure salva- 
tion, it must be in the discipline of His discipleship and 
in the grace that makes us like Him. We cannot plead 
our own ignorance, or the Divine indifference and neg- 



THE MIRACLE OF DREAMS. 219 

lect. All things that insure the supreme ends of life 
are ours, if we will but use our talent for good, and do 
'His will. The results of our obedience or disobedience 
are inevitable. Whatever a man soweth that shall he 
also reap. He that soweth to the flesh shall of the 
flesh reap corruption. And he that soweth to the spirit 
shall of the spirit reap life everlasting. 



^^And the how shall he in the cloud : and I will look upon 
ity that I may remember the everlasting covenant between 
God and every living creature of all fiesh that is upon 
the earthy — Genesis ix. i6. 



XX. 

THE CONSTANCY OF THE DIVINE ORDER IN 
NATURE. 

T^HE book of Genesis gives a brief sketch of the 
divine order of things in the history of creation, 
and of man in his earlier condition and experience, 
which, though imperfect as an exhaustive and scientific 
statement, is still a broad and solid groundwork of 
fact, and, properly interpreted, is consistent with the 
profoundest research and the most critical philosophy. 
What appears unmistakably is the gracious expression 
of the infinite Deity in the production of the universe 
and its inhabitants for a beneficent purpose, — the 
fact that underneath all the phenomena which we call 
nature is the power and wisdom and goodness of God, 
and that the creature, man, is precious in EKs sight. 
What I desire to present to your attention is the 
stability of the divine order in creation, the perma- 
nence of the divine methods and government, which 
are all tokens of the infinite benignity of the Highest. 
Because it is declared that God set His bow in the 
cloud in token of a gracious covenant that there should 
be no more such universal destruction as that which 
had come upon the earth in the deluge, it is not to be 
inferred that before this time no rainbow had ever ap- 



222 AFTER TRINITY, 



peared. If the sunshine had fallen on the raindrops 
previous to the date of the event recorded, just the same 
beautiful phenomenon had been witnessed, for like causes 
produce like results. What was emphasized by calling 
attention to its natural appearance was the faithful- 
ness of God in the economy of His works. He would 
assure the mind of Noah and of his descendants that 
the gracious processes of nature should go on. He 
declared a covenant to the effect that no more such 
floods should inundate the earth ; and no sign of His 
veracity and goodness could be more appropriate for a 
token than this beautiful child of the sun and shower. 
God says to Noah, " I will look upon it, that I may re- 
member the everlasting covenant between God and 
every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.'^ 
There is something very touching and assuring in this 
language, for it bids us think that in the very pro- 
duction of what is so lovely to the eye, in the very 
doing of the thing which creates the admirable object, 
God says, " I am mindful of my promise j the very 
operation of my laws is the evidence of my tender and 
everlasting regard." Two different tendencies have been 
manifested by mankind respecting the wonderful opera- 
tions of what is denominated nature, both of which 
are fatal to right views of the Supreme Goodness, and 
hence to our highest welfare. The tendency of primi- 
tive man, unenlightened in mind and heart, was to 
attribute all the darker aspects of nature — storm and 
flood, and earthquake and whirlwind — to a vengeful 
deity, or to deities who delighted to wreak their passions 



THE DIVINE ORDER IN NATURE. 223 

in fickle and capricious outbursts of violence upon man- 
kind. We know from historic records how largely this 
belief obtained among the heathen, and how terribly 
furious these unseen powers seemed to them. With 
such notions of the government of the elements and 
the world ; feeling exposed to the pitiless rage of \vind 
and lightning, and deluge and fire and ice, — in their 
dread and fear they sought to propitiate the awful gods, 
and deemed nothing too precious to sacrifice, if they 
might avert their terrible displeasure. It is easy to see 
that if such a dark superstition should become universal, 
how discouraging it would be to all enterprise, how 
chilling and blighting to all cheerful views of life, how 
destructive of that effort which needs constancy and 
order in the divine operation for its basis, how, in a 
word, it would react with fatal power upon the char- 
acter of man, making him capricious and cruel and 
bloodthirsty and revengeful, like the deities he feared 
and would conciliate. There is hardly a crime or an 
abomination that v/ould not finally spring out of such 
foolish and dreadful notions of the phenomena of 
nature. 

The other tendency, likewise injurious and mistaken, 
is to remove God altogether from His universe, to attrib- 
ute simply to what are called laws the whole wonder- 
ful economy of the visible creation, as if these alone 
were sufficient for the perpetuity of the gracious order 
essential to the high ends of being. This tendency is 
greatly formed by the influence of one-sided scientific 
studies, or what results from a contemplation merely of 



224 AFTER TRINITY. 



one aspect of science. It is nothing which true science 
promotes, or for which it should be held responsible ; for 
science, properly studied, is suited in the most impres- 
sive way to open one's mind and heart to the most 
affecting disclosure of a present God. The disposition 
of many people, however, who acknowledge the exist- 
ence of the Almighty is to think of Him as remote 
from His works, especially when the ordinary course 
of things goes on in nature. But when some sudden 
and terrible phenomenon appears, some great con- 
vulsion, some catastrophe that is destructive, then 
you note that the same minds that were quite unim- 
pressed by the tranquil and regular process of things 
are quick to attribute the dreadful reality to the Al- 
mighty. For instance, the tornado careers over the 
earth, sweeping forests and villages before it, and toss- 
ing man and beast as autumn leaves in its path ; the 
ocean is heaved up so that the tidal wave engulfs cities 
with their inhabitants ; lands are deluged by rivers that 
tear away their embankments ; the earth is parched by 
long and fierce drought j the thunder-bolt smites with its 
lance of fire j the earthquake swallows the monuments 
of industry, and the lava-flow engulfs great towns in its 
burning sea, — and the cry is, " Lo ! the visitation of 
God.'' People pray for mercy, and it seems to them that 
the Almighty is near and terrible. But is He any nearer 
than in the soft sunshine and the vernal dews ? Does 
He put forth His hand any more unmistakably than 
when He tints the flower or swells the pulp of the grain ? 
Is His speech any more emphatic or significant than in 



THE DIVINE ORDER IN NATURE. 225 

the lapsing waters, and musical zephyrs, and the blue 
skies, and the murmurs of the fragrant groves ? There 
is a strange unmindfulness of His presence and His 
power in what is ordinary and without startling phe- 
nomena in His works, as if He were not acting and 
speaking, unless by some astonishing token that brings 
terror and death. And a great many pious people come 
to think that it is chiefly in spiritual things that He is 
concerned, — that it is almost a sin to recognize His 
love and goodness in the daily and regular operations 
of the visible creation. They seem to feel that it is a 
slight upon His grace to acknowledge that His good- 
ness is expressed in all the common and ordinary things 
of life and nature. Of course the highest of all inter- 
ests are the interests of the soul ; but the soul is edu- 
cated, enlightened, and set forward graciously, in every 
way that God is allowed to deal with it. That is not 
wisdom nor genuine spirituality that ignores or depre- 
ciates any of the instruments of His love, or that slights 
any tokens of His presence, or the provisions of His 
mercy. The mind that is most open to the evidences 
of His glory, and which carries with it a conscious- 
ness of His loving-kindness and benign purposes, will 
be most likely to be devout and obedient. As I have 
stated, I wish you to think of the stability of the 
divine order and processes in the world; and if we 
regard the character and nature of the Almighty as 
we ought, we shall feel that gracious assurance which 
will stimulate both our devotion and our industry, and 
hence be most productive of our good here and here- 
10* o 



226 AFTER TRINITY. 



after. God Himself declares that He is the unchange- 
able One ; and because He is God, the universe that He 
has made is ordered in righteousness, and has the 
elements of constancy and permanence. The whole 
economy of things is most wise and good, and their 
phenomena can vary only in accordance with the prin- 
ciples which belong to the material of the universe. 
He has constituted the elements as they are, the 
ingredients of things of every kind, and under like 
operations like results will be obtained. Certain prop- 
erties exist in the soil, the water, the air, the vegetable 
and animal kingdoms. The effects of these, under the 
same circumstances, do not change. The germ always 
sprouts, if the conditions are favorable ; and the fruit 
ripens, the rain falls, the frost comes, the ice melts, food 
nourishes, and life expresses itself. There is no failure 
of any thing after the same process, if the method is 
exactly the same. The same air, the same water, the 
same soil, the same food, always produce the same re- 
sults, unless there is some different interference. There 
is exactly the same constituents in the particular min- 
eral, plant, and animal respectively, and under like treat- 
ment the effect is the same. Gravitation, electricity, 
magnetism, chemical property and change, maintain 
their constancy of operation. It is so all through 
nature. So there is nothing that can be attributed to 
freak, to caprice, to chance, to any absolute disorder. 
All the changes, the perturbations, the discords, the 
confusions, the conflicts, that appear in nature, go on 
according to as certain a plan and as true an order as 



THE DIVINE ORDER IN NATURE. 227 

what we call the most perfect harmonies. There is 
just as perfect a regularity in the tornado, in the water- 
spout, the deluge, the thunder-storm, the earthquake, as 
in the vicissitudes of day and night, the flowing of the 
brook, the dew-fall, the expansion of the leaf, the growth 
of the child, the shining of the stars. What seem dis- 
cords and convulsions in nature are the regular action 
of forces which are jus! as legitimate as the fertilizing 
power of the soil, or the frost in winter. Our infirmity 
of right apprehension consists in the fact that we are 
unable to trace these forces, as we can* some others, and 
so we are often surprised and confounded by unexpected 
displays and awful phenomena. If we could see the 
influences which were gathering in the earth all through 
their processes, we could calculate the earthquake as 
certainly as we can the ripening of the summer grain. 
If we had known, for instance, the exact state of the 
groundwork of the reservoir, and the action of the 
water upon it, we could have predicted the inunda- 
tion that swept down the valley of Mill River, to 
a day and an hour. The same is true respecting the 
coming of the whirlwind, the tumbling down of ava- 
lanches and precipices, the liberation of malaria from 
the marshes, the descending thunder-bolt, the drought 
that blisters the earth till there is famine and death. 
The regular order goes on. The elements of matter 
perform their legitimate functions, but we are ignorant 
of a great deal that is preliminary to the disclosure, and 
the conditions that ensure the result. It seems to be 
one of the providential ordinations that man, with his 



2 28 AFTER TRINITY, 



gifts of intelligence and reason, shall learn to avail him- 
self of the constituents and uses and order of things, 
and so make them contribute to his advantage. But he 
finds that the same force or element may be harmful or 
beneficial. The water which drowns and devastates, 
quenches his thirst. The lightning that smites to death, 
carries his messages of love around the globe. The 
fruits whose juices intoxicate to' fiendish madness, nour- 
ish and comfort him. He can make the fire his faith- 
ful servant or his terrible scourge. Out of the same 
plant he can extract medicine or poison. He can con- 
vert the same mineral into an instrument of life or death. 
But in all this contrariety of uses there is no antagonism 
in the processes of what he calls nature, — no collusions 
or caprices or contradictions. The result follows the 
cause with as certain effect as the rainbow on the cloud 
when the sunshine gleams in the drops of the shower. 
The divine order of things goes on. It is for man to 
employ for a noble purpose the gracious arrangements 
of the universe. And the fact of the regularity and 
stability of the economy of nature ought to be a solace 
and an inspiration to him. If he should feel that the 
world is governed by chance, that even in the least 
things there is disorder and capriciousness, there could 
be no such strong confidence as is essential for earnest 
effort and productive industry. But knowing that the 
operations of nature are constant ; that the govern- 
ment of the universe, from the infinitesimal atom to the 
measureless worlds, is divine, and on principles that 
admit of no freakish fluctuations; that nowhere and 



THE DIVINE ORDER IN NATURE. 229 

at no time the infinite and all-wise and all-gracious God 
is absent, so that any possible chance can operate, — 
one can have the very highest incentives to labor in the 
line of the good and useful, which are secured by em- 
ploying the methods as ordained. But because of the 
inevitable sequence of causes in nature, man is not to 
think that there is nothing for him to do to make nature 
serve him, in new ways and with a manifold munificence. 
The crude material is given him, the great and marvel- 
lous forces of all her kingdoms are afforded : but he has 
to learn how to employ them, how to secure the service 
that is most beneficial. And he is constantly doing 
this ; still he would not, were he not convinced that 
these gracious operations would go on. Without this 
confidence he would not sow his fields, nor build his 
home, nor venture upon the seas, nor adapt any mechan- 
ical contrivance to a special work. He advances in 
possession and power as he gets at the secret of the 
processes of nature, which, when learned, never cheat 
him. Already he has made the waters do his bidding, 
in bearing his freights and in driving his machinery. 
He has compelled steam to execute gigantic labors in a 
thousand fields of industry. He has summoned the 
lightning to be his messenger, so that on the speed of 
thought he speaks to the ends of the earth. He takes, 
the light froiA the stars, and in its colors tells the sub- 
stances of distant worlds. The time will come when 
he will sail through the air with the swiftness of the 
wind, when he will call down the rain at his bidding, 
direct storms to different quarters of the land, and con- 



230 AFTER TRINITY, 



vert a great deal that is now, through his ignorance, 
harmful or destructive to friendly agencies and helps 
to his enjoyment. In saying this, I do not presume 
upon the divine prerogative any more than by claim- 
ing the propriety of reclaiming wild and unproductive 
nature to profitable cultivation. No one thinks now 
that it is any trespass upon the province of the infinite 
Creator to secure by cultivation the most admirable 
flowers, the choicest grain, the most delicious fruits j to 
make the sun paint pictures, to make deserts blossom 
by irrigation, to mend speech and sight by surgical art, 
to predict the coming storms by the observations made 
in a hundred posts over a vast territory by scientific 
tests. And so it will be only employing the very meth- 
ods of nature to make other achievements of a useful 
character, when the means to do so are sufficiently 
understood. In all these modifications of the natural 
processes, in all the beneficent uses to which nature is 
subjected, in all that the intelligent will and power of 
man cause her to perform, he is making no essential 
change in the constitution of things ; he is neither con- 
triving nor enacting any new law, he is importing no 
new force whatever into the grand creation. He is 
only using nature in a way analogous to the use of 
himself. The savage only partially uses himself so far 
as the highest service is concerned. For how many of 
his powers are locked up ! How narrow his capacity of 
insight ! How meagre his knowledge ! How poor the 
resources of the mind in the higher spheres of thought 
and endeavor! But the cultivated scholar commands 



THE DIVINE ORDER IN NATURE, 23 1 

the learning of the ages. He gives instruction in all 
science. He builds cities, constitutes governments, 
equips and directs armies, controls the forces of steam 
and electricity, converts the wilderness into a garden, 
and of the ore and tree builds implements that bring all 
the wonders and treasures of foreign climes to his door. 
But he only works in the line of his creation, his apti- 
tude. So in our management of nature we are only 
bringing out the realities that are latent there, are only 
putting to service what is given and ordered of God. 
No man need think that the end is reached yet in the 
control that man will have of the marvellous constitu- 
ents and forces of the universe. He has as wonderful 
triumphs to make in the future as have signalized the 
past. No one can put the exact limit to his achieve- 
ment. But whatever he gain of good can only be in 
the line of nature itself, can only be in accordance with 
the essential principles and laws which are of God. In 
this direction his gains will be good, because God is 
good ; for His whole creation bears the stamp of His 
benignity. And, as I have said, the inspiration to this 
effort, and to all effort, is in the sincere belief in the 
constancy of the divine order in creation, — the sure 
confidence that certain causes must produce certain 
definite results. The Bible does not hesitate to speak 
of God as creating, as disclosing Himself in His 
works, as guiding man in the knowledge and use of 
the world in which he is placed, and as the present 
Lord who will not give His glory to another. And 
one very important thing is gained if we acquire a 



232 AFTER TRINITY. 



State of mind that recognizes a present God, that is 
permeated through and through with such a conviction 
of the Infinite One as shall assure a calm trust in His 
unchangeableness, His infinite wisdom and love, and 
that shall inspire an effort of life in harmony with His 
laws and in accordance with His will. If we can only- 
feel profoundly the fact of God near, and in all, and 
over all, we shall be moved, in the light of the gospel of 
Jesus Christ, to live as becomes sons and daughters of 
our Father ; we shall seek to find out all we can that 
may make the world we live in of higher use to us ; we 
shall strive to conform ourselves, our lives, more and 
more to the perfect methods of God ; we shall take the 
promise of God to Noah as to ourselves ; and in every 
fair thing we see in earth or sky, in the bud and dew, 
in sunshine or shower, in the changing seasons and in 
all the marvellous growth and changes around us, we 
shall hear the promise of the divine fidelity, the stability 
of the universe declared. Then we shall not merely 
think of the Almighty in the awful phenomena that 
alarm, but in all the courses of the world. We shall be 
taught to make useful the forces that, in our ignorance, 
hurt and destroy. We shall see that love is everywhere 
working, everywhere speaking, everywhere helping, and 
that it is for us to be dutiful and obedient, and so in- 
dustrious and virtuous and holy. And looking for the 
perfect example, and for the light that shall guide us, 
and for the Saviour who has made expiation for our 
sins, we shall see Jesus, with His face shining with the 
brightness of the Father's glory, and we shall take His 



THE DIVINE ORDER IN NATURE. 233 

hand and follow His steps, and find in the love of His 
deep, true heart a joy and an inspiration that shall ena- 
ble us to do the works that are given us to perform. 
We shall find in His sympathy a companionship, and 
the grace of His atonement a deeper knowledge than 
Noah could attain ; and it will be our meat and drink 
then to do the will of Him who made all things, and by 
whose pleasure they are and were created. 



" The works of the Lord are great ^ sought out of all them 
that have pleasure therein^ — Psalms cxi. 2. 



XXL 

AN AUTUMN WALK. 

TT is autumn time again, with the mists and the shim- 
mering sunlight, the crispy air of the mornings and 
the dreamy haze of afternoons, the colored foliage, the 
peculiar forest odors, the inarticulate repining sounds 
coming you know not whence from the pensive land- 
scape, the pathos of flowers withering and leaves falling, 
the russet stubbles, and the briefer days that you have 
known so often before, the same time of brilliant change 
and fading glory that the year always brings, whether 
we wake or sleep. You have come out of the city, we 
will suppose, for a little while to the familiar scenery 
wdiere the hills are piled upward with their rainbow 
splendor, and the meadows sleep behind the brown 
ridges, and the orchards drop their fruit on the sunny 
slopes. You recognize the fields where you once wan- 
dered and perhaps toiled, the lakelet and streams, the 
groves, the mountain-paths, the secluded nooks, and the 
quiet dwellings amid the farms, the pictures of which 
time does not efface during the longest absence. You 
are thankful for a day of rest, a day of random wander- 
ing and of reverie. Here, at least, you can be true to 
self. None shall rally you on an unmanly sensibility, 
even if the tears start to your eyes. The tension of 



236 AFTER TRINITY. 



artificial life is here removed. You are free with Nature 
in her sincerest moods. 

Almost instinctively you have come to the old home- 
stead, — perhaps the abode of strangers now, — and in a 
sort of abstracted air you follow the narrow foot-paths 
where once trudged your little feet to the garden where 
you first noticed the miracle of growth, to the spreading 
fruit-tree beyond, to the clustering vines against the 
wall, and to the edge of the pasture where the .golden 
rod and purple asters stand bright in the sun. Ab- 
sently you pick up an apple beneath the bough that 
used to drop them for you, and stand looking as one 
who dreams. The hills do not seem so far off now as 
they did once, nor is there such wonderment in the fan- 
tastic clouds and the blue spaces of sky between the 
trees. There was the swing in the great oak, and the 
playhouse on that bank ; and there you caught the big 
butterflies as they hovered over the sweet clover, and 
saw the swallow sail and circle and vanish into the 
silent heavens. And dear faces float before you again. 
That mother, if you could see her, would she look now, 
as when tired and fretful you nestled to her arms ? The 
call, the smile, the kiss, the tender chiding, those stories 
that you loved to hear repeated from her lips, you re- 
member it all. And that father, how strong and good 
he seemed, as clinging to his hand you went a little 
way into the fields and were lifted over the hedges and 
walls, and came back with a bunch of spring violets in 
your hands and the delight of a new experience in your 
heart. Ah, the pictures of infancy, how they cluster 



AN AUTUMN WALK, 237 

here ! The house, the shrubbery, the trees, the road- 
side, the sky, gleam with them. And the voices, the 
faces, the cheer, the morning and evening benediction ! 
The household group will never get together again on 
earth. The baby is now a woman grown ; and one, may- 
be, is over the sea; and one is never mentioned per- 
chance, though he is never forgotten ; and one lies under 
the daisies. Is God as near to you now as when you 
lingered in the old home ? 

But quietly you have sauntered on by the bordering 
thickets of the country lane, where the robins used to 
sing before you, and the ground-squirrel stop and chat- 
ter, and where you gathered nuts from the hazel bushes 
and the jagged hickories, till the little school-house is 
plain in view. It is not in your heart to turn away. 
You cross the play-ground, you linger around the well- 
remembered nooks, you mark the signs of youthful 
activity and caprice, — noting change, of course, perhaps 
improvement ; but something here touches you deeper 
than any reminiscences of the academy or the univer- 
sity. Through the uncurtained windows you see the 
children as of old, — the fresh faces and the roguish 
eyes, quaint little bodies, in queer garments, the meek- 
looking and the mischievous. There, too, is the famil- 
iar buzz of the educational hive. But your playmates ! 
There they sat, there they gambolled, and at first life's 
ripple and then its great wave swept them out. Little 
do you know of most of them now. But that glossy- 
haired girl, so like an unsullied flower, fell asleep long 
ago ; and the noble-browed boy who sat beside you lies 



238 AFTER TRINITY, 



with a bullet in his heart in a Southern grave ; and the 
incorrigible truant of the woods is a noted naturalist ; 
and the rough youngster is immersed deep in stocks 
and trade ; and another, whose life opened so fairly, is 
deserted in her lonely house ; some are in high places 
and some in low, scattered and dead, and youth all 
gone, — and you go away over the knoll with the picture 
of the weary, pleading face of the school-mistress in 
your thought. You did not understand her then, poor 
heart ! You did not know yourself, nor why, as the 
years went on, such a tremor of strange joy came to you 
in the autumnal woods, and your ears rang with vague 
voices calling from the future, "come hither," and the 
dawn of something wondrously fair was before you. 
It has passed now, and you need no human tongue to 
interpret what is said in these fading leaves and low 
dirges of the October wind. Early manhood, early 
womanhood, the unfolding of the rose of life. None 
are watching you now beneath the golden screen of the 
uplands, so you may let the buried visions come forth. 
You smile, maybe faintly, but your pulse is quicker. 
Ah, how many times has the fall, in dyed garments 
like him of Bozrah, stood on these hills since your hope 
was flushed as gloriously ! Some bright phantoms, of 
course, you have followed, and some you have aban- 
doned ; yet the old dream of good, the imperishable 
good, does not wholly die. But once all the landscape 
was spring ; and the lilies bloomed, and the winds 
shook odors as they passed, and the birds were in tune 
with your heart. You think of the one peerless face 



AN AUTUMN WALK. 239 

that filled your vision, and the great hope beyond ! But 
you have grown stronger, sterner since, and the world 
' thinks, wiser. Busy days, mature experience, gray hairs, 
the scars of many a battle with the world. But are the 
lilies in your heart ? Is life as noble a boon, and 
arched by as grand a sky ? What are the russet fields 
saying to you, and the withering herbage at your feet ? 
You are too candid to sneer, and too sad to smile. 
You found early enough that the bloom gets rubbed 
from the soul, that the conflict is hard to the conqueror, 
and that the soil of sin is deep within. Soon enough 
you learned that you had misread the heart of man, and 
miscalculated your own uncertain strength. Well, in- 
deed, if you let the Good Shepherd lead you now. 

With sober face you have passed over the pleasant 
upland, and down the glen where the stream tinkl-es 
over its rocky channel, and through the open glade 
where the light is warm on the grass, and it seems that 
some magnetic spell has drawn you on, for you come 
out at the old country church. It is lonely there in the 
stillness of the afternoon. The swallows have left the 
mossy eaves. A blue-jay calls in the distant trees, and 
the dead leaves rustle in the walk to the dingy door. 
How often have you stood, in the quiet of Sabbath 
mornings, holding a parent's hand, on those rough 
steps, while the honest country folk gathered, saluting 
each other with cheerful talk ere they entered the open 
door. And how peaceful and solemn seemed the place 
within, where prayer was so sincere, and the pastor led 
the flock to the green pastures of the divine love. Way- 



240 AFTER TRINITY, 



ward and thoughtless though you were, the sacred in- 
fluences that fell upon you here passed deep into the 
texture of your being. Many a night, years ago, when 
alone, have visited you the blessed memories of this quiet 
sanctuary; and the charm still lingers. The pastor's 
kindly voice, the christening, the wedding, the funeral, 
the confirmation hymn, and prayer and sermon and 
sacred festival, — associations as deep as life are bound 
up with what was seen and experienced here. Ah, had 
you only followed the better angel, had you only kept 
the fresh glow of devotion alive, the retrospect of life 
would hardly be what it is now. And you cannot lean 
there on the church-yard wall, where clings the un- 
pruned bramble, with the gauzy, autumnal sky above 
you, and the far-off complaining murmurs of the land- 
scape in your ears, without still, deep thought. Is not 
the " narrow way " after all the best ? Page after page 
of human history is opened to your view. How sad the 
waste of talent that you have seen. How affecting the 
lessons of a frail, erring humanity. Pleasure, wealth, 
office, empty adulation, it all ends here, you say, looking 
at the graves within the enclosure. Their ranks have 
lengthened fast: more names, new epitaphs. Rever- 
ently you enter ; but it seems strange that so many 
whom you knew in their activity and buoyant hope 
should be lying here. And why not you ? There is the 
little mound which you have never forgotten in your 
wanderings, and the long grass is growing over it, grass 
that is yet green, though the roses are faded and the 
forget-me-nots are dead. But one frost-pink is bloom- 



AN AUTUMN WALK. 241 

ing still, the gentian flower, blue and delicate and pure, 
looking to heaven with serene and hopeful eye. It has 
been many years since one sad day you stood here and 
saw the dust sprinkled on what was so dear. It did 
not seem that you could smile for a long time after that ; 
and the flowers looked cruel to be so sweet, and the 
May days mocked you with their unfolding beauty, and 
you missed so much in the house, that was everywhere 
haunted by the perfume of a joy that had vanished. 
Dear spot ! no wonder that heaven seemed but a little 
way off when you placed the precious treasure here, and 
that the benediction of the risen Saviour to his disciples, 
" peace be unto you," had a new meaning, and that a 
home where there would be no separations was more 
and more desired. Well is it, if the bright path of the 
loved one heavenward is clear to you now, and in spirit 
you thither aspire. But other graves that are very 
sacred to you are here, or somewhere. That of a father, 
or mother, or sister, or of one dearer than all, and who, 
vanishing, left the whole earth empty. Ah, vvhat are the 
vain shadows that men pursue 1 What now seems the 
glare of fashion, the pride of place, the glitter of wealth ? 
How far remote from Vv'hat is of most real and blessed 
import is the bustle and jar of the mercenary, sordid 
world. It all went on the same when these graves were 
filled, and so it will v/hen you depart. The circle that 
misses you v/ill narrow more and more, and after a few 
years none will remem.ber you among the living. Tired 
hands, weary brain, aching heart, will not rest be sweet 1 
But after all, musing here, memories of healing and of 
II p 



242 AFTER TRINITY. 



peace steal softly into your thought. The days have 
not all been bleak. The road has not all been uneven. 
You have had your part of the good here, — perhaps 
more than many. " In ways that you knew not " you 
have been led often by the "still waters." Something 
precious you have gathered when the thorns were 
sharpest. Even in burials you were conscious of a 
treasure that the earth could not claim. And a Father's 
hand has been touched by you more than once in the 
darkness. After all, you believe that it is good to live. 
Like the radiance falling from the October sun through 
the crimson trees, flecking the grass with gold amid the 
shadows, so are the days dark and bright ; and the 
bright are more than the dark, the sweet more than 
the bitter. With this uplift of your spirit your eyes are 
raised j and as meet your gaze the hills in their royal 
vestments, and the tender rose tints of the horizon, and 
glimpses of the valley in its dream of peace, you say, 
" Surely if this is the perishing, what must not be the 
imperishable ? " And, starting up with the impulse of 
the thought, you pass again through the secluded lane, 
and across the hollow between the woods, and up the 
stream v/here the dead leaves eddy in the current, along 
the path where the sumachs flame and the dog-wood 
and hazel bushes and blackberiy vines blend their fad- 
ing colors, till on a grand, grassy eminence you stand, 
around you the great oaks, madder-red, and the maples, 
though half denuded, glowing yet like scarlet banners, 
and spread out below and afar the autumnal landscape, 
mellowed all over with the charm of mingled hues and 



AN AUTUMN WALK. 243 

softly sifting light. In the distance are gleams of 
luminous water, and dashes of crimson and gold amid 
the hemlock glens, and quiet homesteads sleeping by 
orchards whose fruit is not all harvested, and complacent 
cattle wandering and reclining in the pastures, and old 
elms yellow and sere by the creek, clambered over with 
creepers bright as threads of fire, and the far-off moun- 
tains, purple and blue, and over all God's wondrous sky. 
The nuts drop now and then in the woods, and a squirrel 
barks, and there is a gentle rustle of falling leaves ; and 
the whirr of the partridge is faint down the thicket of 
the ravine. It is glorious you say, — very beautiful! 
and, blending with -the low repining sounds of the land- 
scape, the distant, tender memories of your own soul 
moan and sing and float away, and a teasing pain, as 
of something drawing you onward, is in your heart. 
The calm and the beauty and the mystery of all stir a 
consciousness of the infinite. Onward your thought 
goes, beyond mountain and sky, beyond sense and time ; 
and in this grasp on the unseen, this yearning for the 
imperishable, you feel that it is not for a day that you 
live, not for a little hoarded gain, or a few thrills of 
sensual pleasure. Life seems awful in its grandeur. 
Its affections, its hopes, its aspirations plead for the 
eternal. You feel that all the delights of the past, all 
the glories of majestic nature, all the voices that with 
such mystic language speak deeper than articulate 
words, are hints of the possibilities of your being in a 
larger sphere. It cannot be, you say, that such a nature 
that takes up the wondrous meanings of creation, that 



244 AFTER TRINITY. 



mingles with such rapt awe with the splendor of flower 
and sun and star, that gathers such a joy in the inti- 
inacies of kindred intelligences, that feels in itself such 
an expanding power of insight and dominion, is to perish 
like the ephemera of the twilight, or the leaf of autumn. 
And there, with the solemn sense of immensity brood- 
ing over you, with the forest odors touching your 
subtlest spirit with far-off dreams, comes a strange, 
deep home-sickness for heaven, for the gathering of the 
loved, for the vision of the unutterable beauty, for the 
purity and rest of the beloved in the Lord. And then, 
as meeting the necessities of your nature, you recognize 
the fltness and sweetness of the gospel. After all, you 
say, " He of Nazareth spake as never man spake." It is 
true, all true, this infinite need for God, this disclosure 
of grace in Him who is the likeness of the Father and 
the express image of His person. Surely " in Him is 
life, and His life is the light of men." And, coming 
out to the highway, whom should you meet but your 
pastor, dear to you for his hearty manhood. He, like- 
wise, has been forth to commune with the spirit of the 
season, and on his face is the flush of an inward joy, 
and a light is in his eye that tells of a faith in things 
unseen. He takes your hand warmly, for in his own 
experience he reads yours, and says, as friend speaks to 
friend: "In your own heart are the intimations of 
immortality. This day have come to you the visitings 
of God. Is there any such light as that shining in the 
face of Jesus Christ 1 Is there any sure anchor to the 
soul but the blessed hope that is in Him ? In a little 



AN AUTUMN WALK, 245 

while the fever and the fret of this Ufe will be over. But 
the keen, immortal spirit renewed in love, its trimnph 
and joy have but begun. Let us go back to our work 
with this day's experience illumined by the divine word 
in our hearts. The past is gone. Let us live wisely in 
the present, and feel, in the use of our blessings, that 
the Lord is leading us and training us for His holy hab- 
itation." And you say, "Amen, amen." 



NATURE, HUMANITY, RELIGION. 



XXII. 

A G A S S I Z. 

/^NE revelation of God is His material universe, and 
the more we know of this the better able shall we 
be to use the wondrous gift of life as it was designed. 
All knowledge is good, and that w^hich instructs men to 
be holy is the best. While we attach an infinite value 
to the word of God as expressed in the Bible, we must 
not forget that by the word also were made the things 
that are seen. God expresses Himself in all His works. 
*' Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night 
showeth knowledge." There is really no antagonism 
in the revelations of the Almighty, His written word, 
and His infinite works. We see but a part now of the 
perfect meaning, — enough to direct us to the way of 
everlasting life, but not the whole that may contribute to 
the possible advantages of man. Those who interpret 
the meanings of the spiritual and of the physical universe 
are both showing the Divine thought and will. If they 
make now and then discords in their utterance, we may 
be sure that there is harmony below them. Whatever 
man may say, God does not contradict Himself. While 
we rejoice unspeakably that He has made the path of 
salvation so plain that none need err therein ; that He 
has shown the heavy-laden a place of rest, and those 



250 NATURE. 



who hunger and thirst for righteousness how they may 
be filled, — we are not to imagine that no blessing attends 
the discovery of the wonderful verities of His hands, 
which men call Nature, or that in the uses of physical 
knowledge there are not benefits in a large sense to 
both body and soul. A fair sight of what the great 
scientists have found out and reduced to practical uses 
would not only fill most beholders with astonishment, 
but excite a profound gratitude for their agency in pro- 
moting our human welfare. How few, for instance, 
know or think, as they send or receive telegrams that 
are so important to their interests, of the long and labo- 
rious studies that prepared the way for modern tele- 
graphy. 

The same may be said of the application of steam to 
locomotives, the printing-press, photography, electrotyp- 
ing, the telescope and microscope, physiological truth, 
and all the vast subjects of science and its applications. 
A person deeply in earnest in the pursuit of truth retires 
to his laboratory, or pursues his studies in obscurity in 
converse with lonely Nature, and the bustling world 
does not give him credit for much usefulness there, with 
his acids or salts or gases, his stones and weeds and 
bones and insects and scrapings of the deep sea's bot- 
tom ; his strange instruments ; his quiet indifference to 
the business and pleasures of mankind : yet what he is dis- 
covering or inventing becomes in due time a mighty factor 
in the great forces of the world's concerns. It appears 
in sanitary knowledge ; in the economies of industry and 
commerce ; in speedy transportation, time-saving ma- 



AGASSIZ. 251 



chinery, beautiful fabrics, more wholesome food, grander 
power over nature and her possessions, more perfect 
demonstrations of the creative wisdom and benignity. 
These investigations, apparently so remote from the 
practical concerns of life, show finally their intimate 
connection with every thiag of human interest and ad- 
vantage ; and those who are doing most for man's mate- 
rial good are those who, to the common eye, seem to be 
engaged in the most unpractical and useless occupa- 
tions. But profound studies of the physical world, 
however far removed they may seem from the utilities 
of life, are still the richest contributions to this end. 
They finally not only eventuate in human comfort and 
temporal well-being, but they co-operate with and sup- 
plement the knowledge that, by its immediate relation 
to the soul, is termed spiritual. It is, therefore, true 
that great naturalists and savans are among the world's 
benefactors. They earn and deserve the applauding 
recognition of their noble services to mankind, who 
through them are helped on to greater dominion over 
both Nature and themselves. 

Of the most illustrious names that have promoted the 
cause of useful science in the present generation, none 
is higher than that of Agassiz. While I am prevented 
by lack of time for due preparation to do any thing like 
justice to the labors and character of this noble student 
and interpreter of the works of God, I have too pro- 
found a recognition of his greatness to let the opportu- 
nity pass without giving at least some feeble tribute to 
his memory. Louis John Rudolph Agassiz was largely 



252 NATURE, 



and richly endowed. His mind was fashioned on a 
colossal scale. His temperament was lively and enter- 
prising, his reasoning faculties keen and comprehensive, 
his nature deeply impressible to all excellent influences, 
and his physical constitution of such a frame as to en- 
dure the most laborious efforts and activities. His 
early youth gave promise of rare intelligence, and it was 
his good fortune to receive his first instructions from a 
Christian mother, who \vas gifted and accomplished 
beyond the usual range of womankind. He w^as tract- 
able and enthusiastic as a pupil, needing no stimulus 
but a love of learning to keep aglow the ardor of studi- 
ous pursuit. At an early age he had become intimate 
with the naturalists of the Continent, who recognized 
and applauded his genius ; and as a young man he en- 
joyed the friendship, among others, of Martius, Cuvier, 
Schelling, Dollinger, and Humboldt. Before the age of 
thirty he w^as known to the scientific society of Europe, 
and had received honorable distinction from universi- 
ties and learned bodies. With the most remarkable 
industry he prosecuted investigations covering fields 
but little examined, and commending more and more 
his talents and attainments to the most accomplished 
scientists of the world. To give any really intelligible 
view of his enormous labors through his lifetime would ^ 
require the compass of a good-sized treatise. • His work 
on the Fresh-Water Fishes of Europe ; on Fossil Fishes, 
which occupied ten years of labor ; the Zoological No- 
menclator, containing an enumeration of all the genera 
of the animal kingdom ; his Bibliotheca of Zoology and 



AGASSIZ. 



253 



Geology ; his valuable papers on the echinoderms ; his 
extensive studies of the glaciers and the glacial system ; 
his investigations in conchblogy ; his vast work, entitled 
" Contributions to tlie Natural Historv of the United 
States ; " his multifarious contributions to popular sci- 
ence by papers in periodicals and journals in this coun- 
try and Europe, and by numerous lectures, — show the 
amazing fertility of his genius, and his almost incredible 
industry. 

During these fruitful and toilsome years, besides 
preparing for the press this vast amount of valuable 
scientific matter, he has made most diligent personal 
investigations over wide areas of the earth to study 
physical facts and to verify his theories. He explored 
Germany and Switzerland on foot ; wandered over the 
British Isles ; pursued his critical labors with the Coast 
Survey all along the Atlantic shores of the United States ; 
familiarized himself by personal observation with tlie 
geology of New York, the great Lake Superior region 
and the Rocky Mountains ; spent a long period in the 
wilderness of the Amazon ; and, in fact, carried his 
studies in portions of the earth most rich in subjects 
that could best interpret this wonderful universe. 

Agassiz worked with a definite aim, and his studies 
-were undertaken with reference to some general ques- 
tion, and made a test of the value and soundness of 
some general principle. " The papers and works w^on 
echinoderms aimed at a classification of these animals, 
and a better appreciation of their structural differences 
from the other types. The monographs upon shells, 



254 NATURE. 



living and fossil, were prepared with a view to testing 
the range of distribution of species in past ages, and the 
limits of their special characters. The researches on 
fossil fishes are intended to show the relations of living 
and fossil species, and their embryonic development in 
one of the most extensive classes of the animal kingdom, 
the existence of which upon earth may be traced back 
to the earliest periods in which animal life was called 
into being. The investigations upon the glaciers were 
called forth by a desire to connect the history of the 
physical changes our globe has undergone with the 
phenomena exhibited by the developments of the organic 
kingdom." Everywhere in his works we discover a 
tendency to the most extensive generalizations ; while 
in every instance the knowledge of the facts, a candid 
study of the most minute relations of his subjects, has 
been his constant aim in all his investigations. His 
searching and comprehensive inquisitions into nature 
led to the belief of distinct types of the animal king- 
dom, and the theories of Darwin and Herbert Spencer 
have had no opponent so able and thoroughly scientific 
as he. 

Agassiz, on purely scientific grounds, declares himself 
led to the belief in an Almighty Creator of the Universe ; 
in fact, he regards His existence established by the 
most rigorous demonstration. He shows that species 
do not insensibly pass into each other, but that each 
has its appointed period, and is not connected, except 
in the order of time, with its predecessor. He says 
(I quote his own language ) : " An invisible thread in all 



AGASSIZ. 



25s 



ages runs through this immense diversity, exhibiting as 
a general result the fact that there is a continual prog- 
ress in development ending in man, the four classes of 
vertebrates presenting the intermediate steps, and the 
invertebrates the constant accessory accompaniment. 
Have we not here the manifestation of a mind as pow- 
erful as prolilic ? the acts of an intelligence as sublime 
as provident ? the marks of goodness as infinite as wise ? 
the most palpable demonstration of the existence of a 
personal God, author of all things, ruler of the universe, 
and dispenser of all good? This, at least, is what I 
read in the works of creation." 

Such testimony, drawn from purely scient'fic sources, 
and independent of all other evidence, must have enor- 
mous weight. 

I could not prepare the way for what I wish to say 
about this great naturalist as a man without making this 
reference to his works, though for any thing like an 
exact and satisfactory account one must look to the 
memorials that his scientific friends will prepare of him, 
or to his works themselves. His death, in the full vigor 
of his intellectual strength, when he was giving a more 
decided impulse to scientific education than ever before, 
and when he was better prepared, by the possession of 
the vast accumulations of his museum, to use his im- 
mense stores for the promotion of human knowledge in 
the domain of nature, cannot, humanly speaking, be 
too much lamented. It is likely that it w^as precipitated 
by the tremendous strain of his faculties in the gigantic 
enterprises of his genius, added perhaps to the solicitude 



256 NATURE, 



and disappointment that I am told he experienced in not 
securing the financial aid that he sought from the public 
funds of his adopted State in support of his museum, — 
in the work of carrying out his noble plans for making 
the institution the efficient agency that he desired. 

What we note, in addition to the vast knowledge and 
intellectual greatness of the man, is his admirable and 
noble character. He had a remarkable sweetness of 
disposition. There was always around him a sunny 
atmosphere, and none could be with him without feeling 
the magnetism of his great, warm heart. His pupils — 
and they are numerous and cultivated — bear consent- 
ing testimony to his cheerful and affectionate spirit, his 
cordial interest in their prosperity and success, and his 
large, strong sympathies with all that appeals to gener- 
ous human sensibilities. He inspired them with the 
ardor of his own bright and pure enthusiasm, and noth- 
ing that was mean or selfish could thrive in the earnest- 
ness of the pursuit of truth in which he engaged them. 
It is easy, therefore, to see how deep became the personal 
attachments of those who were under his instruction : how 
they revered and loved him. There could be no better 
evidence of his genial, affectionate, sympathetic disposi- 
tion than the power that he had over ardent and gifted 
natures, and the sweet impressions that he has left on the 
lives of so many of the truest and most interesting peo- 
ple in the land. It would seem that his soul had drank 
in the loveliness of the wonderful and beautiful page of 
nature, and that he reflected in his own life the light 
and cheerfulness that lie on the works of God. 



AGASSIZ. 257 



There was in him, too, a simphcity, a child-like 
naturalness, as admirable as it was instinctive. With 
the half-educated — those ambitious merely of the 
na7ne of learning — there is often noticed a conceit of 
knowledge, an ostentation of attainments, an assump- 
tion of superiority, a kind of dogmatism and aiTogance 
that are repulsive and absurd. There was no shadow 
of this in Agassiz. With all his mental grandeur 
and vast acquirements, he was still the humble pupil 
of nature, the unpretending citizen, the quiet, urbane, 
courteous gentleman. In his simple, natural way, he 
w^ent about his work, intent upon accomplishing the 
ends of science, and oblivious, apparently, of what the 
world was thinking of him. In his lectures, his private 
instructions and social intercourse, his travels, and his 
fatiguing and exacting labors, he carried a serene and 
artless spirit, whose sincerity was very winning and 
impressive. He was utterly free from the affectations of 
the pedant, and the robust genuineness of the man had 
a wholesome and stimulating flavor that made his society 
delightful. 

I shall never forget a little incident of his life, which 
I merely mention because it gives a key to his character. 
I was with him once in the small cabinet of a college, 
which he was examining with a good deal of interest, 
and where he was just as modest as if all the scientific 
treasures of the earth were before his eyes, when a 
singularly formed turtle-shell from the Mississippi was 
shown him, wdth the request that he should name the 
species to which it belonged. Taking it into his hand, 

Q 



258 NATURE. 



with the candor of an unspoiled child he said : " I don't 
know this/' The confession surprised us, as we knew 
that the study of turtles was a favorite branch of inves- 
tigation with him, and that here he was profoundly 
learned. In a moment or two, however, he remarked, 
very quietly : "' Ah ! I see ; it is a malformation," which 
it really was, though it required vast knowledge of this 
sort of creatures to detect the fact. We can all imagine 
how the commonplace professor, desirous of keeping up 
a name for knowledge, would have managed to conceal 
his ignorance. 

One mark of Agassiz's greatness was in this freedom 
from all vain ostentation, all pretence of learning, to 
secure attention to himself. The cause of truth was 
infinitely dear to him ; and he saw such boundless wealth 
in the storehouse of the universe, that his mind always 
kept the attitude of a humble learner and a patient 
inquirer of nature's manifold and majestic meanings. 
It was this candor, modesty, simplicity, a perennial 
freshness of spirit in connection with his massive intel- 
lect, that enabled him to pursue with such eagerness 
and success the studies that have rendered his name 
immortal. The frame of mind in which he lived was 
suited to the happiest prosecution of his chosen labors, 
to the search for and the recognition of the wondrous 
truths of nature. It was enough for him to find what 
the record of creation said, and in the presence of the 
august revelation he was lowly and docile as a child. 

And this leads me to mention one more feature of his 
character, which, blended with the others, expressed his 



AG AS SI Z. 259 



nobleness, — and that is, his reverent spirit. He realized 
deeply the grandeur and the uses of life. All that was 
related to man's interests and place upon the earth was 
sacred to him. He felt, in his investigations of this 
mysterious frame of things, that he was searching out 
the meanings of God. There was constantly before 
him the evidences of the Almighty's creative wisdom 
and benevolence, and his daily thought was all vital 
with the consciousness of the Infinite Supreme. So he 
lived face to face, as it were, with the glorious and 
solemn facts of a present Deity. Reading so constantly 
the records of the divine wisdom and love, and pene- 
trated so deeply with a sense of life's object and possi- 
bilities, he bore about with him a spirit of reverential 
awe, — a recognition of God that was both an inspira- 
tion and a joy. In such a habit of life his heart could 
never grow old. 

The poetical tribute that Mr. Longfellow addressed 
to him on his fiftieth birthday, which so vividly por- 
trays his beautiful career, has now a touching signifi- 
cance : — 

It was fifty years ago, 

In the pleasant month of May, 
In the beautiful Pays de Vaud, 

A child in its cradle lay. 

And Nature, the old nurse, took 

The child upon her knee. 
Saying, *' Here is a story-book 

Thy Father has written for thee." 



NATURE. 



*' Come, wander with me," she said, 

Into regions yet untrod, 
And read what is still unread 

In the manuscripts of God." 

And he wandered away and away 
With Nature, the dear old nurse, 

Who sang to him night and day 
The songs of the universe. 

And whenever the way seemed long, 

Or his heart began to fail. 
She would sing a more wonderful song, 

Or tell a more marvellous tale* 

So she keeps him still a child, 

And will not let him go, 
Though at times his heart beats wild 

For the beautiful Pays de Vaud. 

Though at times he hears in his dreams 

The Ranz des Vaches of old. 
And the rush of the mountain streams 

From glaciers clear and cold ; 

And the mother at home says, *' Hark ! 

For his voice I listen and yearn ; 
It is growing late, and dark. 

And my boy does not return ! " 

But his mortal career has closed ; unexpectedly he 
has passed away to the larger life, leaving both hemi- 
spheres, wherever science is honored, in mourning. 
Nevermore on earth shall we see that noble form and 



AGASSIZ. 



benignant face illuminated by the generous soul. Never- 
more shall we welcome with honest pride the news of 
his successful labors, or mark admiringly the sagacity 
and magnitude of his glorious enterprises in the cause 
of knowledge. That capacious brain teems no more 
with fruitful thought. The friendly hand is still. The 
loving eye sleeps while the world applauds. It is more 
than a private sorrow that weeps over the grave of 
Agassiz. His work here seemed but half done, though 
already so gigantic ; who shall take it up where he 
dropped it for another field? 

And yet we thank God that he has lived. He is one of 
the benefactors of mankind. His memorial is in the great 
truths that he has enunciated to mankind. They are 
not barren and dead and cold and hopeless, but vital 
with the meanings of God ; full of hopeful inspirations ; 
fragrant and luminous with the messages of a goodness 
that pervades all things, and in which the universe 
exists. His influence, therefore, cannot perish, and, 
though the world's loss would have been less had a score 
of those who live highest in mere official position been 
removed rather than him, w^e bow to the dispensation, 
and are grateful that a being so gifted and so useful has 
done his part so nobly in this generation. There was 
no soil upon his name that could stain its honor. In 
every relation of life he was pure. As husband, parent, 
citizen, philosopher, he was blameless among men. In 
many a household, in many a studious chamber, besides 
in the home that was consecrated by his presence, is 
there a sad yearning now for the light that has gone out 



262 NATURE. 



with his departure. But there is no place, except his 
own vacant fireside, over which the shadow falls more 
heaxy, and the chill of death strikes deeper, than in 
bereft and desolate Penikese, where the group of pupils 
that gathered at the charm of his genius bow like 
orphans, and through their tears see the pictures that 
they cherished of their long, sweet fellowship with him 
fade and vanish. The flowers on his grave are dewy 
and fragrant with the love and reverence of sincere 
souls throughout the world. His royal life goes on. 



XXIII. 

SUMNER. 

/^REx\T virtues, associated \vith great talents and 
beneficent service, are not a spectacle so frequent 
in public affairs as to command no special observation. 
In the selfish ambitions and political intrigues that are 
so conspicuous in national annals, it is always inspirit- 
ing and instructive to find examples of character that 
illustrate devotion to the highest principles of patriotism 
and the noblest type of citizenship. Of such is the 
illustrious scholar and statesman in whose memory we 
bring the tribute of our gratitude and applause. It is 
due to the cause of civil liberty which he advocated, to 
the fair humanities which he represented, and to the 
manly virtues and righteous principles which he ad- 
vanced, that his great name be held up for the recogni- 
tion and approval that it eminently deserves. 

I cannot portray the noble services of this distin- 
guished patriot, without some reference to the personal 
qualities that made him remarkable. He w^as endowed 
by nature with a capacious and vigorous intellect, an 
iron will, and a temperament of high and unconquer- 
able energy. His memory, which was originally reten- 
tive, was cultivated to a rare degree of power. With 



264 HUMANITY. 



the most indefatigable industry, animated by an enthu- 
siasm for knowledge, he had gathered information from 
all available sources, and was master of all learning 
that could utilize his gift of statesmanship. His ac- 
quaintance with literature was vast and critical in both 
ancient and modern composition. He was an intelli- 
gent lover and patron of art. In science and philoso- 
phy he was furnished with the latest conclusions of the 
most exact investigations. Probably no man living was 
more profoundly versed in the laws of nations, or more 
deeply grounded in the vital principles of jurisprudence. 
His studies and meditations led him to the largest views 
of the interests of mankind, and to an elevation where 
he could observe the value and workings of doctrines of 
universal applicability. The atmosphere in which he 
habitually lived was that of the scholar ; and if he was 
ever accused of impracticable theories, it was because 
he would not employ questionable expedients in striving 
to promote the permanent interests of mankind. As an 
orator he stands unrivalled among the brilliant list in 
our country of those who have shed lustre on the bar, 
the pulpit, and the halls of legislation. His logical 
mind, the elegance of his culture, his profound convic- 
tions, his exhaustive research, the moral attitude of his 
position, his fearless independence, and his wonderful 
mastery of language, in connection with the causes for 
which he pleaded, made him the exponent of some of 
the noblest specimens of eloquence that have graced 
the present century. His speeches on " The True 
Grandeur of Nations," " Freedom National, Slavery 



SUMNER, 265 



Sectional," " The Crime against Kansas," the " Bar- 
barism of Slavery," " Our Foreign Relations,'' are among 
the great masterpieces of classic oratory, and will stand, 
with the utterances of Pitt and Fox and Burke, models 
of elaborate, dignified, and convincing speech, as long 
as the English language endures. 

But however great his accomplishments and talents, 
I should not speak of him here had he not consecrated 
them to the service of the republic and humanity. The 
time has passed when a review of his devotion to the 
strong convictions of an enlightened philanthropy can be 
stigmatized as promotive of sectional animosity. He 
lived long enough and illustrated sufficiently the breadth 
of his sympathies, and the fairness and wisdom of his 
statesmanship, to dispel the prejudices of those who 
once thought his influence and endeavors were inimical 
to the interests of the whole country. 

There is something admirable to the ingenuous mind 
in that chivalrous magnanimity that could lead a young 
and gifted scholar, highly bred and educated, surrounded 
by aristocratic connections, and intimate with the dis- 
tinguished society of two continents, to accept, instead 
of a career that would ensure ease, present applause, and 
happiness, one that would ensure odium, opposition, and 
peril, and to pursue it in the face of detraction and vio- 
lence until it was successful. If there could have been 
a temptation to a young man of such splendid prospects 
to share an immediate success, to gain the smiles of 
influential politicians and the plaudits of the masses, 
in a word, to secure worldly favor of a very seductive 



266 HUMANITY, 



kind, that temptation must have come to him. But 
whatever the solicitation, he put it aside for a rough 
path, and great burdens, and a thorny crown of suffering. 
He showed as convincingly as action can show that he 
loved justice more than pleasure ; that his faith in right 
was greater than his fear of detraction ; that his passion 
for liberty was higher than personal ambition ; and that to 
promote the interests of mankind was the supreme con- 
cern of his life. Without seeking for official place, while 
free in the expression of political sentiments, it came to 
him as the testimony of confidence in his patriotism and 
ability. But he did not accept his election to the senate 
of the United States with any subscription to party 
bonds or policy. It was only with perfect independence 
to act according to his best convictions that he con- 
sented to take his seat in that dignified branch of the 
national legislature. 

The principles that animated him on his entrance 
into public life he maintained to its close. He never 
swerved from the path that he deemed right, whatever ' 
might be the consequences to himself. History, I think, 
affords no case of one engaged prominently in civil 
affairs where the convictions of an enlightened con- 
science have been more strictly adhered to than in his ; 
where one has been less influenced by popular clamor ; 
where there has been a loftier independence in the dis- 
charge of duty, greater disdain of temporizing expedi- 
ents or personal consequences. This phase of his 
character I cannot impress too strongly, or hold up too 
high for admiring imitation. He was a man of convic- 



SUMNER. 267 



tions, of strong, clear conscience ; a man who dared to 
do what the emergency seemed to require; a man who, 
in the support and vindication of principle, was as in- 
flexible as Caesar, as just as Aristides, as pure as Cato. 
Knowing, as we do, the general character of our legis- 
lative assemblies throughout the country, the lack of 
individual conscience, of a generous disinterestedness, 
of a zeal for the public good, of high-minded integrity ; 
seeing, as we have to see, the alarming evidences of 
ignorance, demagogism, and corruption, — we cannot 
appreciate too highly this strong, conscientious, uncom- 
promising soul, entering upon the discharge of duties 
that would bring him into disfavor with the majority ; 
while even from friends he could expect but a doubtful 
or lukewarm support. It is the moral attitude of the 
man to which I here refer, his fearless courage, his in- 
domitable patience, his inflexible purpose, his lofty faith 
in the triumph of righteous principle, and the intrepidity 
with which he flung himself into the cause on which he 
believed depended the honor, the utility, and the per- 
petuity of the republic. The spectacle is reassuring 
and inspiring in contrast with the dark pictures of per- 
sonal greed and cowardice and political degeneration 
that mark the times. 

It was not because man was black or white, because 
he was of one nationality or another, that he espoused 
his cause, but because he was Man, and, by virtue of 
his creation and endowments, the inheritor of the right 
to himself and all that he could fairly win by the best 
use of his faculties and opportunities. I do not here 



268 HUMANITY. 



impeach the motives of those who in good faith opposed 
Mr. Sumner's opinions and policy, and who saw the 
facts as they then existed in different relations and 
meanings from his view. We greatly err unless we 
make due allowance for the influences of education, 
sectional claim, personal interests, the power of politi- 
cal passions, and manifold factors that operate in the 
field of political controversy. These facts no philo- 
sophic observer can ignore, and these help explain the 
impediments with which Mr. Sumner had to contend 
in his earlier career in the senate. 

I am not acting the part of a historian, and there- 
fore refer to events only to illustrate more clearly the 
character that we are now contemplating. It will 
be remembered by some how difficult it was for Mr. 
Sumner in those early days to overcome the obsta- 
cles that were interposed in the senate to his introduc- 
tion of any proposition in whose discussion he could 
enunciate the great doctrines of human liberty that were 
so near his heart ; and how^ at last it was only by a piece 
of ingenious, yet most legitimate, parliamentary tactics 
that he obtained the floor to present the subject of 
" Freedom National, Slavery Sectional.'^ I shall never 
forget how the opening paragraph of that speech thrilled 
me, nearly twenty-two years ago, as reading it I saw in 
my mind's eye the intrepid senator rising amid the 
^ scornful and indignant looks of a hostile majority, and, 
with a voice that had been suppressed by the discourte- 
ous advantage of those in power, declare, "Beyond all 
controversy or cavil it is strictly in order. And now 



SUMNER, 269 



at last, among these final crowded days of our duties 
here, but at this earliest opportunity, I am to be heard, 
not as a favor, but as a right. The graceful usages of 
this body may be abandoned, but the established usages 
of debate cannot be abridged. Parliamentary courtesy 
may be forgotten, but parliamentary law must prevail. 
The subject is broadly before the senate. By the bless- 
ing of God it shall be discussed." 

But such devotion as his to the doctrines of the fathers 
and founders of the republic ; such a fearless advocacy 
of liberty, at that time of intense political agitation, — 
could not fail to ensure painful personal consequences. 
It was only after many provocations that he was moved 
to severe but suitable reply. His memorable speech on 
the " Crime against Kansas " really cost him his life, for 
from the shock of the murderous assault that followed 
its delivery he never fairly recovered. Its violence 
would have killed outright one of less perfect health 
and magnificent physique than his. I am free to con- 
fess that only in one other case in my lifetime did an 
intentional physical injury to a public man strike me 
with a hurt so excruciating. It seemed that in those 
blows patriotism, virtue, liberty, law, the very heart of 
the republic, were smitten ; for it was not the man merely 
that I then beheld prostrate, but the ideas, the sympa- 
thies, the hopes, the justice that found in him so elo- 
quent an advocate. 

I suppose that comparatively few are aware of the 
tortures that Mr. Sumner endured in the treatment that 
was finally adopted for his relief, or the mental anguish 



270 HUMANITY, 



that he experienced in view of duties that pressed for 
performance. In a letter which he wrote to me, describ- 
ing his condition, about two years after his calamity, a 
letter dated May 9, 1858, he says: "From the begin- 
ning of my calamity I miscalculated its extent, and lived 
in weekly, almost daily, expectation of my accustomed 
strength, so that I might again resume my active duties. 
Only six months ago I thought myself on the verge of 
perfect recovery, when, without any adequate cause, 
after only a slight exertion, I found myself debilitated in 
the extreme, unable to walk without pain, or rise from 
my chair except slowly, and like an old man of ninety. 
This condition is now again passing away, so that I 
think of returning to Washington to vote on questions 
of interest. But I have learned that I must regard my- 
self for a long time to come as an invalid, especially 
avoiding those very labors which I have most at heart, 
and seeking the restoration of my shattered system 
through repose of the injured part, and incessant exer- 
cise in the open air. But I feel a deep disappointment 
at seeing so much of life and precious opportunity pass 
away unemployed." 

To a great soul like his, spurred by a high ambition 
for usefulness, to feel crippled in the very blossom and 
noon of life, forced, like a caged eagle, to the seclusion 
of the invalid, while eager to serve the high interests of 
his fellow-men, was a bitter trial. I should fail to note 
an amiable feature of his character if I did not relate 
that through the darkest period of his sufferings, and the 
years that followed, no unbecoming word of complaint 



SUMNER, 271 



passed his lips. He had no malediction for the hand 
that dashed the brightness and vigor from his manhood. 
In his forbearance and fortitude are revealed but another 
aspect of his greatness. 

Other and later trials has he known, sharp and rasp- 
ing to a proud and sensitive spirit, but they too were 
borne with dignity and composure. From the period of 
his return to his place in the senate to the day that he 
breathed his last, his career has been a consistent exem- 
plification of patriotic fidelity. We all know with what 
wisdom and devotion, during the war, he supported the 
government ; how potent for good his influence on our 
foreign relations during years of disaster and threaten- 
ing complication ; how close he stood to Mr. Lincoln in 
life and death at the Capitol, and how generously and 
disinterestedly since the settlement of our civil discords 
he has dealt w^ith every subject that could promote paci- 
fication, fraternal harmony, and the general good. 

Indeed, one reviewing his public life sees all along 
how his labors were directed to practical and gracious 
ends. When the slave-power was menacing the repub- 
lic, he sought to quell it. When rebellion had its hands 
upon the ark of the Union, he strove to preserve this 
sanctuary of liberty. When peace returned, he en- 
deavored to utilize its advantage everywhere, without 
regard to past events or locality. When a powerful 
policy seemed about to precipitate difficulties with a 
foreign power, he interposed in time to avert the danger. 
To destroy old feuds, to ensure the rewards of industry, 
to extend the safeguards of righteous law, to have gov- 



272 • HUMANITY, 



ernment discharge its proper functions throughout its 
whole jurisdiction, was the end he labored to promote. 
But in all the years of his devoted public service, what- 
ever the criticism concerning his policy, he lived above 
the suspicion of corruption. Whatever his opportunities 
of personal emolument, his hands were clean. He 
might be accused of a dictatorial imperiousness of spirit, 
and of an impracticable political virtue, but none could 
impeach his honor. Of all the disgraceful imputations 
that stain our legislatures, he was free. No man ever 
dared approach Charles Sumner with a bribe, or even 
with a proposition that had a taint of dishonesty. No 
man could say that he ever sacrificed principle for the 
sake of gain, or to escape censure. No man could ever 
point to a sentence of his that was impure, or unbecom- 
ing the lips of truth. 

I shall not even seem to strengthen this eulogium by 
comparing him with other names that, by eloquence, 
patriotism, and statesmanship, are nobly eminent in the 
records of our country. But without detracting in the 
least from the fame of those whom we justly admire 
and venerate, I can ask, without any doubt concerning 
the reply, if there has been among our public servants 
a character more lustrous with integrity than that of 
this great tribune of human rights j if there has been an 
orator whose eloquence, springing from deeper sources, 
will survive to more remote generations ; if those legis- 
lative halls, sacred with historic associations, have con- 
tained a nature of more heroic mould; if learning, culture, 
the amenities of graceful citizenship, have had a more 



SUMNER, 273 



distinguished representative ; if there has been shown a 
spirit more sincere, of larger sympathy, of purer aim, of 
loftier intelligence, of intenser patriotism, of more com- 
prehensive statesmanship ? Has man had, in the strug- 
gles and trials of our national existence, a more tireless 
and accomplished advocate ? One more page of our 
parliamentary and legislative record is unsullied. We 
can point our children now to an example of public 
virtue at home without need of reference to Roman 
models. Amid the political degeneracy of the times, 
fair as a white lily on the sluggish pool, is this clean 
name, fragrant with honor. How puerile seems the 
gabble of politicians in the trumpet-peal of his inspiring 
speech ! How trivial seem the insignias of mere office, 
how empty the highest political station, beside a life 
ennobled and consecrated like his ! The grandeurs of 
wealth and title do not of themselves touch me ; but to 
those whose characters and deeds are messages of light, 
who move and replenish our higher energies, who eman- 
cipate life from its thralls and burdens, I instinctively 
bring the tribute of gratitude and admiration. I revered 
and loved Mr. Sumner for a greatness that was benig- 
nant. I am not ashamed of my tears in a grief that 
reaches the nation's heart, and goes far beyond the 
Atlantic. I am indebted to him as to few in this or any 
generation, and am thankful that I can cast my offering 
with those more expressive ones upon his coffin, before 
the dust covers it from human sight for ever. We thank 
God for this heroic and useful life. If one sign of fol- 

12* R 



2 74 HUMANITY. 



lowing the Master is to suffer willingly for his little 
ones, to accept the cross and wormwood in the way of 
daily duty, then here was a token of discipleship. That 
life for many years was a sad one. I wish it could have 
been happier. As I think of it, it has a melancholy 
grandeur that is pathetic. And yet it was all sincerely 
and faithfully used to the last. A nation mourns. Yet 
we shall not honor our illustrious dead without heeding 
the lessons of his life. How few are left to battle with 
duplicity, peculation, and dishonesty in high places ! 
Where are we to look for new champions of principle, 
who can wear the mantle of our dead patriot ? 

It is time that we purify our official stations of cor- 
ruption. It is time that Christian manhood, sinewy, 
pure, and bdld, be enthroned in seats of trust. 

From those dead lips seems to come a summons to 
the people to take heed lest they be ruinously enthralled 
and deluded by the knavery of demagogues and time- 
servers. And if I hear any appeal from that bier, 
guarded so lovingly in the State Hou^e of Massa- 
chusetts, and to which millions turn sad eyes, it is that 
the suffrage of the people be given m intelligent con- 
viction of what is right ; that the trust of political power 
be committed to the incorruptible and vigilant and 
wise, who will serve in the fear of God ; and that liberty, 
won through so many ages of struggle and suffering, be 
guarded with a sacred jealousy and transmitted to the 
latest generation. 

Charles Sumner's earthly*career is ended. He and 



SUMNER, 275 



his fame are secure in the gratitude and affection of the 
commonwealth. What the venerable Bryant said of the 
good Lincoln on his death, can be said of this great 
champion of man : — 

" Thy task is done, the bond are free ; 
We bear thee to an honored grave, 
Whose proudest monument shall be 
The broken fetters of the slave." 



XXIV. 

K I N G S L E Y. 

"pOR some twenty years Charles Kingsley has stood 
in the inner circle of those who have commanded 
the grateful tribute of my intellect and my heart. His 
remarkable writings have refreshed and instructed me. 
I have looked with admiration on his brilliant gifts and 
exalted character. His grand enthusiasm was conta- 
gious, and the breadth and quality of his manhood and 
his energetic genius have given me peculiar inspiration. 
I freely confess my indebtedness to him ; and, now that 
he is dead, I can do nothing less than cast one flower 
of gratitude and affection upon his grave, even though 
it be a poor, pale blossom of these wintry days. 

The Rev. Charles Kingsley was descended from an 
ancient family, w^hose line of distinguished ancestry goes 
far back in English history. He was born in 1819, in 
Devonshire, England, whose beautiful scenery he has 
so graphically described, and was educated at home till 
fourteen years of age. At the University of Cambridge, 
which he entered early, he was noted for his spirited 
and generous disposition and intellectual brilliancy. 
He gained here a scholarship, and a first prize for 
classical, and a second for mathematical, attainments. 
His moral earnestness, his fine tastes and sympathies. 



KINGSLEY, 277 

and enthusiasm for knowledge when a student, were 
prophetic of the remarkable career of the man. It is 
said that he studied law at first, but afterwards turned 
his serious attention to theology, entering, after his ordi- 
nation, on the duties of the ministry as curate of Evers- 
ley, and soon after as rector of that parish. Here he 
continued to officiate until 1859, when he was appointed 
Professor of History in the University of Cambridge. 
In 1869 he was made Canon of Chester, and then Canon 
of Westminster ; and for some years, until his death, 
was Chaplain in Ordinary to the Queen and the Prince 
of Wales. Three or four years ago he visited the West 
Indies, near the scene of his "Westward, Ho ! " and last 
winter he came to this country, where he was received 
with the most distinguished consideration. In the 
sierras of California, being exposed to a sudden change 
of temperature, he took a severe cold, which culminated 
in a violent attack of pleurisy, when, in June last, he 
reached Manito, Colorado, where his son, Maurice 
Kingsley, had resided for some years. This sickness, 
which was very dangerous, as described to me by the 
attending physician, no doubt so impaired his naturally 
robust constitution as to render him less capable of re- 
sisting the attack of the pulmonary inflammation from 
which he died in London on Sunday last, January 24, 

1875- 

In appearance Mr. Kingsley was, for many years, a 
picture of physical energy and health. He was accom- 
plished in all manly exercises. Powerfully built, tall, 
muscular, spare of fiesh, with a face whose lineaments 



278 RELIGION. 



expressed both sensibility and strength of character, he 
was an impersonation of the alert and masculine vigor 
that breathes in his productions, and which character- 
ized his life. 

A nature like his could not be idle ; indeed, he seemed 
spurred on by a resistless impulse to a tireless activity. 
Early in his career appeared his " Village Sermons," the 
first of several volumes of stimulating discourses. While 
a young man, he published "Alton Locke, or the Auto- 
biography of a Tailor, '* which produced a wide impres- 
sion by its republican sentiments and sympathy with 
the working classes. There followed " Westward, Ho ! " 
a powerful portraiture of English adventure in the Span- 
ish Main, in the time of Elizabeth ; " The Saints' Trag- 
edy,'' a dramatic poem of rare power, descriptive of the 
rehgious features of the Middle Ages ; '^ Yeast : a Prob- 
lem,'' relating to the theological fermentation of the 
times ; " Loose Thoughts for Loose Thinkers ; " " Hypa- 
tia, or Old Foes with a New Face," a wonderful picture 
of the fifth century in the Orient, and the conflicts of 
Christianity with Pagan life and philosophy at Alexan- 
dria ; " Essays and Lectures ; " " New Miscellanies ; " 
" Glaucus," a study of science along the sea-coast ; 
"' Two Years Ago," an instructive story of English life 
at the pei;iod of the Crimean War ; " Andromeda," a 
poem in hexameter verse ; " How and Why ; " " Here- 
ward, the Last of the English ; " " At Last," a pictu- 
resque account of his late journey to the West Indies ; 
" Health and Education," and other works ; while at 
intervals of every few years a new volume of sermons 



KINGSLEY. 279 



was given to the public. When we think of all this 
literary work, in connection with his pastoral and social 
and professional duties, we are struck with the fertil- 
ity of his brain, and the extraordinary vitality of the 
man. 

Kingsley had a sturdy and powerful energy, which 
breathes in every page of his compositions, — a swift, 
inspiring vigor, that strikes the soul as the fresh, pure, 
'bracing air of the mountain bathes the face and lungs 
of the traveller, who feels his blood tingle and his chest 
dilate with the refreshing breath. The sweep and stress 
of his spirit comes to you with vitalizing power. This 
noble impetuosity and generous earnestness is natural 
to the man, — in him, indeed, there seems nothing af- 
fected. The great force wells up out of the depths of 
his soul like a fountain out of the deeps of the hills. 
Though trained in the classics, and familiar with the 
gracefulness and repose of Greek thought and art, he 
took no antique for his models, — his strong, flowing, 
intense style was his own as much as his strong-knit 
frame and teeming brain. A soul like his partook of 
the prophetic type. He wrote by a kind of inspiration. 
His subject possessed him, and his deliverance was in 
the direct, graphic, free utterance of one whose message 
has to be made. Constituted as he was of such rare in- 
tellectual fibre, and so finely endowed, he had aptitudes 
for a great variety of work, — for poetry, preaching, criti- 
cism, fiction, history, and science. As a preacher, how 
simple, straightforward, and earnest he was, like a man 
charged to speak a word from the Lord, — never daw- 



28o RELIGION. 



dling over his topic, or thinking of embellishment, or 
appealing to unmanly feelings and motives, but swift 
and resonant like a trumpet-blast Those short dis- 
courses of his, rarely exceeding fifteen minutes, are con- 
densed messages of duty and hope and consolation 
and charity and faith in God ; shots from a heart all 
aflame with sights of the everlasting righteousness, — the 
Father of Spirits. With nature, in whose beauties he 
revelled, he was always at home, and at home, too, wher- 
ever there were human hearts to suffer or enjoy. How 
tender he could be, how spontaneous he was, how strong 
in his lines of description and portraiture ; with what 
vivid hues and clear lineaments he brings before you 
the wonders and glories of the natural world, and how 
subtly and finely he traces the scenes and qualities and 
experiences of human life. Whether it is a picture of 
the Thebaid or of Pagan Alexandria, the scenery of 
Devon or of the Spanish Main, the tumults of a mob or 
a saint alone with God, a hovel or a palace, a poor 
maiden in her bewilderment or a hero surcharged with 
a sense of duty, a Neo-Platonist or a Ritualistic clergy- 
man, a sceptical physician or a Christian bishop, you 
have the clear stroke^ the vivid portraiture, the interpre- 
tation of the inner sense. 

These characteristics of his writings are but illustra- 
tions of his great, free, catholic nature. His church- 
manship had vast breadth. His culture was wide. His 
view of human life was large. His apprehension of the 
forces at work in the world was strong and comprehen- 
sive. He saw in many directions, and viewed verities 



KINGSLEY, 281 

at their heart. Conversant with what the old philoso- 
phies and polytheisms had done for man, he could give 
the reasons of his devotion to the blessed gospel, in 
whose light he found the key to man's duty and destiny. 
He never lost sight of the essential thing that makes 
life noble and valuable, while he seemed possessed 
with an ever-present consciousness of his calling to 
help where he could. So we see his strong sympathy 
wdth mankind, his contempt of shams, his love of 
liberty, his zeal for education, his hatred of cant and 
bigotry and priestcraft; his belief in progress, in a 
heavenly Father who governs His universe according 
to the principles of His own eternal justice and eternal 
love. Kingsley's sympathies come out in some of his 
books, — in "Alton Locke," " Hypatia," "The Saints' 
Tragedy," for instance, — in a current so strong that the 
reader is fairly swept on into healthy and invigorating 
atmospheres. There are brief lyrical poems of his that 
touch our deepest nature wherever there is any sense of 
life's pathos and earnestness. His " Three Fishers " 
is a specimen of the way that he enters into the expe- 
rience of our toiling and sad humanity. 

Three fishers went sailing out into the west, 

Out into the west, as the sun went down ; 
Each thought on the woman who loved him the best, 

And the children stood watching them out of the town ; 
For men must work, and women must weep, 
And there's little to earn, and many to keep, 

Though the harbor bar be moaning. 



282 RELIGION, 



Three wives sat up in the light-house tower, 

And they trimmed the lamps as the sun went down, 

They looked at the squall, and they looked at the shower, 
And the night-rack came rolling up ragged and brown ; 

But men must work, and women must weep, 

Though storms be sudden and waters deep, 
And the harbor bar be moaning. 

Three corpses lay out on the shining sands 
In the morning gleam, as the tide went down \ 

And the women are weeping and wringing their hands 
For those who will never come back to the town ; 

For men must work, and women must weep, 

And the sooner it's over the sooner to sleep, — 
And good-by to the bar and its moaning. 

Kingsley's theology^ is not the musty and monkish 
lore that belongs to a sphere quite outside of ordinary 
human life. It is not a thing of notions and speculation, 
nor of routine and conventionality. He is vitalized 
with a sense of the duties and privileges of the life that 
now is. He believes in serving God with all the powers 
of the man, — the body as well as the soul ; while he 
teaches the necessity of curing physical ills, that proper 
treatment may be given to spiritual ones. He has been 
called the apostle of a " muscular Christianity ; " but, 
while he did not originate the expression, it is doubtless 
true that no man of our time has contributed more to 
the promotion of a manly religion, — one that is not only 
free from a narrowing and emasculating sacerdotalism, 
but separate also from the whining, canting, sour-faced 



KINGSLEY. 283 



piety that ignores and depreciates the manifold uses of 
the world. No man has striven more to disclose the 
fact of a present God and heavenly Father, and to jus- 
tify His ways to men. No man has seen more clearly 
the dangers that beset mankind, the elements of their 
glory and their shame, and what conserves their vital 
and enduring interests. No man has pleaded more 
eloquently for the sanctities of human affections and 
ties, the sacredness of the family, the preciousness of 
wife and child ; for a service of God that uses all gifts 
that are ours by birth, education, and grace. While 
clearly awake to the sceptical tendencies of the times, 
while deeply versed himself in the learning of the 
schools, he clings to the old creeds, to the historic 
Christ ; he finds in God manifest in the flesh, in the 
teachings and life and death of the crucified Nazarene, 
" the Light of the World," the pledge of, and the way 
to, the consummation of life's blessedness and salvation. 
Speaking as he does in so many engaging tones, — in 
poetry, sermon, review, fiction, history, and science, — 
Kingsley has wielded an influence more subtile and 
powerful than the casual reader and superficial thinker 
imagines. He wrote for a purpose, — wrote like a man 
profoundly alive to the present, its tendencies, dangers, 
needs, — and at the same time with the Christian's 
sympathies and faith, that deal with truth suited to 
all generations. Take the religious historical novel 
" Hypatia," and while it is a faithful picture of the world 
in the fifth century, delineating its gigantic evils and its 
hopeful life, the atrocities of religious fanaticism, the 



284 RELIGION, 



scepticism, and the superstition and cruelty and dema- 
gogism and sensualism of the times, as well as the pure 
Christian spirit that was as the salt to preserve the good, 
he makes it all reflect the features of the present world 
and age that are so far removed. So, too, in "West- 
ward, Ho ! " "Two Years Ago,'' and other works, there 
come out some lesson of Christian heroism, some dis- 
closure of the truths by which men live, some attesta- 
tion of the divine righteousness, some retribution of 
injustice and transgression, some show of life in its real 
wants and triumphs, which bring their meaning with a 
penetrating and powerful emphasis to the heart. He is 
concerned with the ethics of life, — religion, that involves 
the whole of man's being in its motive and concernment. 
He detects the old foes of the race under their new and 
alluring masks, and tears away the lie. He has a quick 
scent for the real, the vital, the substantial, and gets 
the kernel amid any quantity of chaff that conceals it. 
There is something wonderfully strengthening and reas- 
suring in his hold on the Eternal Goodness, v/hile com- 
prehending fully the causes of suffering and scepticism 
in the world, and all the hindrances to truth through 
the stupidity and follies and sins of men. He is one of 
those who recognizes the infinite life that is in all and 
that upholds all. He speaks not from hearsay ; is no 
compiler, no dispenser of old saws and well-dressed 
platitudes ; does not tell you to listen and receive, just 
because he has gathered something with an orthodox 
and a respectable label upon it, but because he has 
found a nourishment to life. In contrast with this keen, 



KINGSLEY, 285 



earnest, manly, catholic nature, how trivial appear the 
pretensions of mere official position or the utterances 
of a perfunctory divinity. An archbishopric could add 
nothing to such a prophet^s renown. For he is one of 
the teachers and rulers of men by the anointing of the I 
Lord. No sect can confine such a spirit : his mission 
and message are to mankind, the redeemed of God ' 
everywhere. 

It is not to be supposed that Mr. Kingsley was without 
faults ; that his views were always right, that his judg- 
ment was never warped. His faults w^ere those of a 
great, sincere, generous, enthusiastic nature, resolute in 
the service of Christ and humanity. In some things he 
is greatly open to criticism, and would be the last to 
resent it, if fairly done. He had a heroic spirit, with 
some of a hero's infirmities. What I hold up is his 
healthy Christian manhood ; the fresh, vigorous, breezy 
force of his spirit, that was charged with moral integrity ; 
his scorn of the low expedients of craft or tyranny or 
superstition ; his passion for noble ideals of character. 
I see in him a warmth to kindle an enthusiasm for 
righteousness, confidence in man's better nature, a 
courage for the sake of truth, an unshaken faith in 
God. Men of his scope and calibre are never too many 
in the world ; and when they come, those who are wise 
will give them heed. They help liberate men from the 
thralls of tradition, break down the partitions of caste, 
undo the cerements that enwrap forgotten truths, wit- 
ness for the divine in man. Through them the old 



286 RELIGION, 



faith has new vitality and significance. They make, in 
the present, a revelation fresh and sweet of the verities 
of God. Mr. Kingsley has left the impress of his spirit 
upon the age. He combines something of the best of 
the radical and the conservative ; shows that knowledge 
and faith can harmonize in a consecrated life ; is a rec- 
onciler of the material and spiritual ; a prophet of hu- 
manity ; a true minister of the " good news,'' because he 
took of the things of our Lord, and gave them to living 
souls. 

Dying when hardly fifty-six years of age, we may say, 
humanly speaking, that he was prematurely cut off. 
Yet how his life was crowded with work, and how brave 
and true it was. I can think now of upwards of 
twenty volumes from his pen, which have gone on 
blessed errands to mankind. And besides this, how 
devoted a husband he was, how wise and good a father, 
how faithful as a pastor, how kind as a neighbor, how 
large a space he filled in the walks of cultured English 
life. The affliction goes from that home where wife 
and children mourn, to the palace of the Queen, to the 
studies of scholars, to the myriads in town and country 
who have felt the inspiration of his genius and been 
grateful for his thought, to the distant cottage by the 
springs of Colorado, where dwell old friends who have 
loved him long and well. But his light does not go out 
in the grave. We thank God for his strong testimony 
to the grace of the gospel of Christ, for his valiant man- 
hood, for his quickening and enlightening ministry to 



KINGSLEY. 287 



the men and women of to-day. He speaks to us still, 
and will continue to speak, while there is meaning in 
duty, and power in truth, and inspiration in love, that 
aspires and toils for the divine kingdom on earth. His 
speech and life, though many-toned, are one grand tune. 
Such a call as that in his poem, "The Day of the 
Lord," rings out to us now more impressively, if pos- 
sible, than ever : — 

The day of the Lord is at hand, at hand ! 

Its storms roll up the sky : 
A nation sleeps starving on heaps of gold ; 

All dreamers toss and sigh : 
The night is darkest before the dawn, — 
When the pain is sorest the child is born, 

And the day of the Lord at hand. 

Gather you, gather you, angels of God, — 

Freedom, and Mercy, and Truth : 
Come ! for the earth is grown coward and old : 

Come down and renew us her youth. 
Wisdom, Self-sacrifice, Daring, and Love, 
Haste to the battle-field, stoop from above, 

To the day of the Lord at hand. 

Gather you, gather you, hounds of Hell, — 

Faniine, and Plague, and War ; 
Idleness, Bigotry, Cant, and Misrule, 

Gather, and fall in the snare ! 
Hirelings and Mammonites, Pedants and Knaves, 
Crawl to the battle-field, sneak to your graves, 

In the day of the Lord at hand. 



288 RELIGION, 



Who would sit down and sigh for a lost age of gold, 
While the Lord of all ages is here ? 

True hearts will leap up at the trumpet of God, 
And those who can suffer, can dare. 

Each old age of gold was an iron age, too, 

And the meekest of saints can find stern work to do 
In the day of the Lord at hand. 



Cambridge : Press of John Wilson & Son. 



MESSRS, ROBERTS BROTHERS' 

NEW BOOKS 

In Preparation for the Autumn of i875. 



I. 

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fated to be free, a Novel. By Jean Ingelow. 
With numerous Illustrations by G. J. Pinwood. One volume, i6mo. 
Uniform with * < Off the Skelligs. ' ' 

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ROUND MY HOUSE: About the Neighborhood where I 
live in Peace and War Time. By Philip Gilbert Hamerton, 
With Illustrations bv C. O. Murray. One volume, square i2mo. 
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MESSRS. ROBERTS BROTHERS 

HAVE JUST PUBLISHED : 

By the Author of " Christian Art and SymholisniV 
OUR SKETCHING CLUB : Letters and Studies on 

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illustrations. 

By the Author of " The Intellectual Life.''' 

HARRY BLOUNT : Passages in a Boy's Life on Land and 

Sea. By Philip Gilbert Hamerton. With Frontispiece Ilhistration. i6mo. 

$1.50- 

Mr. Hamerton has successfully accomplished a difficult task, and **his book 
for boys reaches the standard of a first-rate one," says \.h.e London Academy ; and 
the spectator says, *' Harry Blount is a fine fe'.low, and we are glad to see him 
safely through his perils." 

By the Author of " The Old Masters " and ''Modern Painter s.'"" 

MUSICAL COMPOSERS AND THEIR WORKS. 

By Sarah Tytler. i6mo. $2.00. 

" Distinctively gossipy and very entertaining. Lovers of music, who read 
for entertainment, wi 1 heartily enjoy these bright and minute sketches of the great 
composers ; in point of readableness they are not surpassed by any similar sketches 
in recent literature," says The (Boston) Literary World. 

PARAGRAPH HISTORY OF THE UNITED 

STATES, from the Discovery of the Continent to the Present Time, with 
Brief Notes on Contemporaneous Events- By Edward Abbott. Square 
iSmo, flexible cloth covers. 50 cents. 

A pocket vade mecuin of great value at this interesting period. It will be 
published on the Centennial Anniversary of the Battle of Lexington and Concord. 

THROUGH THE YEAR. By Rev. H. N. Powers, 

D D., Rector of St. John's Church, Chicago. i6mo. $1-50. 
A co' lection of serious and religious papers suited to the seasons of Nature and 
of the Church. 

A SHEAF OF PAPERS. By Thomas G. Appleton. 

i6mo. $1.50. 

Bostonians in particular, and lovers of good things in literature in general, will 
be glad that the author of these Papers, the rich and ripened fruits of his intel- 
lectual labors, has been induced to gather them into a Sheaf for publication. A 
few of them only have been previously printed. 

MADAME RECAMIER AND HER FRIENDS. 

From the French of Madame Lenorivtant, by the translator of '* Memoirs 
and Correspondence of Madame Recamier.'^ T6mo. $1.50. 
Madame Lenormant's previous volume contained the memoirs of Madame 
Recamier, and the correspondence of her friends. The present vo'ume is the 
complement of the first, and contains her Friendships and her Private Correspond- 
ence- 

THE DEFENCE OF GUENEVERE AND OTHER 

POEiNLS. By William Morris. Crown 8vo. ^2.00- 

The author of *'The Earthly Paradise" has been induced to reprint his earlier 
poems, now for a long time out of print. Tr:e volume was never publ shed here, 
and is therefore entirely unknown to the numerous admirers of Mr. Morris's 
poetry in America- 

FREEDOM AND FELLOWSHIP IN RELIGION. 

A Collection of Essays and Addresses. Edited by a Committee of The Free 
Religious Association. i6mo. ;^2.oo. 



MESSRS. ROBERTS BROTHERS' 

LATEST NEW BOOKS. 



EZRASTILES GANNETT, Unitarian Minister in Boston, 
1824-1871. A Memoir. By his son, W. C. Gannett. 8vo. Price 

fc-oo. 

" This memoir of Dr. Gannett is a volume of five hundred and sixty pages, in 
which one finds not a word too much," says the '* Boston Daily Advertiser." '* A 
deeply interesting record of a life crowded with a great and various activity," says 
the '* Boston Transcript." " We have read no other biography which so com- 
pletely meets the full standard of fidelity as does this," says the *' Boston Christian 
Register." 

*' To read the story of Dr. Gannett's life, as here related, and to trace the cur- 
rent of his thought, will not be to come under the persuasion of his religious faith 
as one truer and better than that which we and the majority of our readers hold ; 
but it will be to make the acquaintance of a very sweet and noble Christian charac- 
ter, and, we trust, to catch some inspiration from a very devoted and benignant 
life," says *'The Congregationalist." 

SOCIAL PRESSURE. By Sir Arthur Helps. i2mo. 
Price $2.25. 

" The last essay in the volume is entitled * Looking Back upon Life,' an inter- 
esting and, in former days, what would have been regarded as an ominous inci- 
dent, considering how soon after its appearance its author's life was to close. It 
is not sad, although it is tinged with a not unpleasing melancholy. The sum of 
it is that the experience of Ufa teaches us that Prudence is the mother of a.l the 
virtues. The book closes with the exclamation, *Alas! this was the final day of 
our friendly conversations,' — truer than the \\Titer deemed when he wrote it. Yes, 
there are to be no more ' Friends in Council.' This is the last time that we meet 
a man who has helped and cheered us until we canie to feel toward him, and now 
to mourn him, as a personal friend. Peace to his ashes, and honor to his mem- 
ory! " — New York Times > 

BRASSEY'S LIFE AND LABORS. By Sir Arthur 
Helps. With a preface to the American edition by tlie author. With 
Portrait and Maps. 8vo. Price 32.50. 

*' It is impossible to give here even a sketch of the roads which Mr. Brassey 
built in France, Belgium, Italy, India, Australia, and England; the list of his con- 
tracts fill six closely printed pages. His chief work in America is the Victoria 
Bridge at Montreal. But, interesting as the narrative of his great operations is, it 
is not that which makes his life so charming. It is the man and his methods, the 
greatness of his heart and his humanity, the beauty of liis character, the health- 
fulness of his influence, the purity and elevation of all his plans, the simplicity and 
faithfulness of his nature, which arv* to be admired and studied.^ The very qualities 
which won for hm the friendship of Mr. Arthur Helps, his biographer, are those 
which should make him the true hero of this industrial age and nation, and give 
him pre-eminence in every active Christian commimity." — Boston Daily Adver 
iiser. 

(iii) 



iv ROBERTS BROTHERS' NEW BOOKS. 



RECOLLECTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS, 1813-1873. 
By John Earl Russell. 8vo. Price ^3.00. 

"This book is solid and instructive, and is agreeably enlivened by anecdote 
and personal allusion. A mild egotism pervades it that makes the reader smile; 
but, as a record of a long, useful, and honorable life, mainly spent in patriotic 
service, it fills him with solemn and elevating thoughts. In these days of shifty 
statesmanship, it is a privilege to read the story of a life like Earl Russell's. Amer- 
ican politicians can learn from its pages what honor means, and how solemn a 
thing it is to make laws for a people." —Literary World. 

SUPERNATURAL RELIGION. An Inquiry into the 
Reality of Divine Revelation. 2 vols. 8vo. Price ^8.00. 

*' Since the publication of * Ecce Homo,' no theological book has attracted so 
much attention in England as this. In a few months it has run through several 
editions. . . . The first three Gospels are treated together, and the fourth sepa- 
rately and very carefully, more than two hundred pages being allotted to it. (3ur 
author may have been a little hasty in some of his citations, a little careless in 
some of his translations, but the grand sweep of his argument is not affected by 
these petty aberrations. It remains one of the most earnest and laborious and 
thorough impeachments of the authenticity and credioility of the Canonical Gospels 
that has ever been made." — Liberal Christian* 

THE FRENCH HUMORISTS. From the Twelfth to the 
Nineteenth Century. By Walter Besant. With portrait of Mon- 
taigne. 8vo. Price ^2.50. 

^ " The object that Mr. Besant has in view is to bring together sketches of the 
lives and works of representative French humorous writers, many of whom, he says, 
have hitherto been almost unknown to the English reader. This, however, is not 
his whole aim ; for he says that he tries to connect the writers with the literary at- 
mosphere they breathed, to depict the conditions of their lives, to show their char- 
acter and genius. The effort to comprise so much in a single volume is no mean 
one, and it is only just to Mr. Besant to say that it has been crowned with success. 
In fact, few books have been put forth more worthy to be studied, and few better 
adapted to entertain while they instruct." — Boston Transcript, 

MAETZNER'S ENGLISH GRAMMAR: Methodical, 

Analytical, and Historical. With a Treatise on the Orthography, Prosody, 
Inflections, and Syntax of the English Tongiie, and numerous Author- 
ities cited in Order of Historical Development. Translated from the 
German, with the sanction of the Author, by Clair James Grece, 
LL.D., Fellow of the Phil. Society. 3 vols. 8vo. Price ^15.00.* 

** It is a work which every student, and especially every teacher of English 
ought to be acquainted with, and it is now within his reach. To attack the three 
volumes in German is no holiday task, even to a reader of ordinary German. It 
is the fullest repository that we have of English idioms, constructions, and changes 
in the forms and usage of our native tongue." — Literary World. 

" Its vast wealth of learning gives it a rare value for purposes of reference, and 
it cannot be consulted by students of philology without the acquisition of new and 
important ideas.'* — New York Tribune* 

ANNUS DOMINI : A Prayer for each day of the Year, 
founded on a text of Holy Scripture. By Christina G. Rossetti. 
Square iSmo. Flexible cloth. Price ^1.50. 

*'These prayers approach nearer the beautv, conciseness, and true devotional 
spirit which characterize the Collects of the Prayer Book and other tried Liturgies 
than any we have ever seen in works of this kind." — The Churchman, 



ROBERTS BROTHERS' NEW BOOKS. 



CHRISTIAN BELIEF AND LIFE. By Andrew P. 
Peabody, D.D., LL.D., Professor of Christian Morals in Harvard 
University. i6mo. Price ^1.50. 

*' This little volume comprises twenty-five discourses delivered in the college 
chapel, and most of them written for that purpose. They are all_ short, rarefy 
extendin.c to more than twelve pages, and tliey do not therefore aim at an ex- 
haustive treatment of the themes discussed ; but there is not one that is unworthy 
of Dr. Peabody's reputation as a ripe scholar, a profound thinker, and a vigorous 
and polished writer. ... In all, we find the same evidences of various culture, 
clear thinkmg, and tender and sympathetic feeling which have characterized all of 
Dr. Peabody's previously published sermons. With nothmg of sectarian feeling, 
and with no reference to disputed doguias of theology, they will be read with 
equal pleasure and profit by persons of every form of religious belief." — Boston 
Transcript. 

CORRESPONDENCE OF WILLIAM ELLERY CHAN- 
NING, D.D., and LUCY AIKIN. Edited by Anna Letitia Le 
Breton. i2mo. Price ^2.00. 

** This is a book of no common interest and value. It is a kind of running 
commentary on the great questions and events which interested the best public of 
England and America during the years which it covers. These topics are treated 
from^ the standpoints of two persons of culture and genius, both of them deeply 
religious, and alive to every thing touching the highest interests of men. The 
general sympathy between the two, and the differences of sex, country, and per- 
sonality give both harmony and variety to the correspondence. ... Of the book, 
as a whole, we can only speak in praise. It is edited with excellent taste, and the 
mechanical ey^cution is good ; and few books of this productive season will yield 
more pleasure and profit to appreciative readers." — Christian Union, 

SINGERS AND SONGS OF THE LIBERAL FAITH, 
being selections of Hymns and other Sacred Poems of the Liberal 
Church in America, with Biographical Sketches of the Writers. By 
Alfred P. Putnam. 8vo. Price ^3.00. 

** This volume will prove of deep interest to members of the Liberal Church, 
and to the Christian community generally. The compiler has ranged the world 
of sacred song for its choicest flowers. He has drawn not alone from hymn books, 
popular compilations of poetry, and recently published works, but from magazines, 
newspapers, old volumes, manuscripts, and all sources from which could be ex- 
tracted beauty and light. The result is a work of thorough value and complete- 
ness. In selecting his authors, Mr- Putnam has not restricted himself to so-caiied 
liberal writers ; wherever he has found truth, religion, beauty, and earnestness, 
there he has chosen. To impart a greater interest to the poetry, he has accom- 
panied the selections with brief biographical sketches, giving a few leading dates 
or facts connected with the history of the authors, and the prominent features of 
their career. The work contains over six hundred poems, and is printed in large 
and legible type. It should find a place on every Christian table." — Chicago 
hiter-Ocean. 

OUR NEW CRUSADE. A Temperance Story. By 
Edward E. Hale. Square i8mo. Price ^1.25. 

*' Mr. Hale has here accomplished the difficult task of writing a temperance 
story that is graceful, enthusiastic, practical, and devoid of fanaticism and extrava- 
gance. Too many of the stories written in the interests of temperance are so 
defective as works of literary art, and are so crude, ill-natured, unwise, and intem- 
perate as to create a general impression unfavorable to them as a class. . . . We 
particularly like the volume and its suggestions because they are so little Utopian, 
so entirely feasible and practicable ; and, also, because the methods pictured in its 
pleasant pages seek not only to drive out an intolerable evil, but, while dohig so, 
to perfect^ and beautify and utilize measures for the general welfare, contentment, 
and happiness of all classes of our people. The book is delightful as a tale, and 
wise as a social guide and reformer.' ' — Christian Intelligencer, 



vi ROBERTS BROTHERS' NEW BOOKS, 



ANTONY BRADE : A Story of a School. By Robert 

T.S.Lowell. i6mo. Price ^1.75. 

" For you who recall the fluttering of school-book leaves, at desks now gone to 
dust, and the waving of sunny hair in the air of long ago ; for you who have been 
boys, or are boys, or like boys, this book is lovingly written." — Extract from 
the A ttthor^s Dedication. 

"A book for boys about boys, — at school, at play, at home; in mischief, at 
work, in good company ; in the fields, on the ice, with the servants, in the streets, 
in the church, on the amateur stage ; in fact, doing just what bo^^s do, and saying 
just what boys say, not only in America, but all over the world, — a wholesome 
and delightful story." — Lo7idon Bookseiler- 

HOW TO WRITE CLEARLY. Rules and Exercises on 
English Composition. By Rev. Edwin A. Abbott, M.A., Head 
Master of the City of London School. i6mo. Price 60 cents. 

" Mr. Abbott is careful to distinguish between writing clearly and thinking 
clearly, but he justly emphasizes the fact that popular speech suffers very largely, 
''R many instances, from the persistent, but ignorant violation of a few simple 
rules. If we could, we would present a copy of this admirable little treatise to 
^•verybody who is, or expects to be, a contributor to ' The Congregationalist.* As 
*^t is, we advise him to buy it." — The Congregationalist, 

THE MORALITY OF PROHIBITORY LIQUOR 
LAWS. By William B. Weeden. i6mo. Price ^1.25. 

** Any person who his accustomed himself to think that the prohibitory legisla- 
tion is, on the v/hole, the best-working machine yet devised in this matter must 
ask himself the second question. Whether, for a good working machine, it is best 
to sacrifice the keenness of moral eagerness, and the sensitiveness of moral'pur- 
pose which belong to a subject of such terrible importance, by referring the whole 
matter to police courts and detectives and search warrants. You would not like to 
have your son's honesty or your daughter's prayers regulated by the trial justices. 
Is it more safe to leave the temperance of tlie town to the same tribunal? Mr. 
Weeden' s book comes none too soon. It will not do to pass it by unnoticed. And 
the advocates of 'free rum' on one side, and of Neal Dow's laws on the other, 
will have their hands full in criticising it." — Rev. E. E. Hale in The Christian 
Union. 

THE CHRISTIAN IN THE WORLD. By D. W. 

Faunce. (Fletcher Prize Essay.) i6mo. Price ^1.50. 

"The general effect of *The Christian in the World' will be to stimulate its 
readers to greater watchfulness, care, and religious fervor. It is an excellent trea- 
tise on Christian self-defence^ and instruction in this art is greatly needed by 
Christians in general." — Christian Union- 

'* Direct, well-balanced, scriptural, up to the demands of the theme and the 
period, and %vrltten in a captivating style of pure English and of glowing earnest- 
ness." — Christian Intelllgeticer. 

QUIET HOURS. A Collection of Poems. Square i8mo. 

Price ^1.25. 

*' For a small present nothing could be more welcome to many people (I am 
sure of this) than a little collection of verses called * Quiet Hours.' I have 
spoken of it before, but day by day I learn to care more for it myself, and to know 
how much o.hers like it. It is in flexible covers, and, if it is too small by itself for 
adesirab.e present, the gift might be enlarged by some other volume or volumes 
similar in size and binding. There are several such, of both prose and verse, 
published by Roberts Brothers." — Boston Correspondent Worcester Spy. 



ROBERTS BROTHERS' NEW BOOKS, vii 



DRESS REFORM. Dress as it affects the Health of 
Women. Edited by Abba G. Woolson. With Illustrations. i6mo. 
Price ^1.50. 

** This book is the summing up of the wisest thhigs that have been said upon 
the subject of Dre^s Reform. It includes the lectures that were given by tlie 
women physicians of Boston, and others, two winters ago, with an appendix of 
fifty pages from the brilliant pen of Mrs. Woolson. 

*' God bless her work, say all of us who have been induced to accept even a few 
of her ideas, and put them into practice ! We know how blessed a thing it is to 
breathe a little easier; to walk in broad-soled 'Miller's boots;' and to bear the 
burdens of life on our shoulders, where they were intended to be put, mstead of 
on our hips. 

"This book will make its way slowly into the work-boxes of women. Many 
will read it and turn up their noses, some wid toss it aside, others will ridicule it. 
But, as surely as the oid Hebrew Bible was desiined to make its way down the 
ages, so surely Dress Reform is to become the most vital question that ever stirred 
a nation of women. ^ Corsets are doomed to everlasting oblivion, and womaa's 
body is approaching its day of freedom." — L. S. H. in The Index, 

A RAMBLING STORY. By Mary Cowden Clarke, 

author of ^* The Trust and the Remittance," &c., &c, i6mo. Price 

*' A more charming story has never been written ; charming in its clear and 
graceful style, its variety of incident, its delicious descriptions, its delineation of 
character,^ and its clever surprises. _ It is a genuine love stoiy, of love at sight ; 
but there is no mawkish sentimentality about it. It is a rambling story, but the 
reader follows it with no flagging of interest, and with no regret, except that the 
rambling so soon ends. It is a luxury to read it in the clear, double-leaded type 
of this volume ; and it is safe to predict such a sale of the novel as will gladden 
the heart of author and publishers," — N'ew Bedford Merctiry. 

MY SISTER JEANNIE. A Novel. By George Sand. 

Translated from the French by S. R. Crocker, Editor of "The Lite- 
rary World." i6mo. Price ^i. 50. 

*'This is the sixth of an edition of George Sand's novels, published in uniform 
style by JMessrs. Roberts Brothers. It is, fiom^ the French standard, a remark- 
able fiction, having a most intricate and exciting plot, displaying a wonderful 
power of language, and dealing wiih philosoph.cal and intricate topics with the 
skill of a professor and marvel. Madame George Sand is a feminine marvel. Her 
fictions are unlike all others, as her style is singularly her own., — free, broad, and 
yet natural, and viithal modest for a French author." — Philadelphia Press. 

WILLIAM BLAKE'S POETICAL WORKS. Edite-:, 
with a Memoir, by William Michael Rossetti. i6mo. Price ^2.25. 

"*The Poems of William Blake' form one of the most remarkable of the 
things half-forgotten by the general reader, whose revivals have in some degree 
the effect of entire novelty. The singular and almost weird character of Blake's 
genius caused it to be but little understood even among his contemporaries, save 
by a few of the greatest of his fellow-artists. And his literary work passed rap- 
idly into comparative obscurity, from which it has now been for the first time 
worthily brought into public^ view, though there have been several previous at- 
tempts to call attention to it. The biography is an admirable one, lending a 
singular interest to the weird, quaint rhymes and occasional wild bits of power that 
follow in the body of the volume. It is a good thm^ to have again some memo- 
rial of the man of whose work Flaxman said, ' The time will come when the finest 
of Blake's designs will be as much sought for and treasiu-ed up as those of Michel 
Angelo.' *' — Appletotis Journal, 



viii ROBERTS BROTHERS' NEW BOOKS. 



MORE BED-TIME STORIES. By Louise Chandler 

MouLTON. With Illustrations by Addie Ledyard. Square i6mo. 
Price ^1.50. 

** In the childhood recollection of many an adult, * bed-time* stories were sto- 
ries of ghosts, giants, and mad dogs. It is a great misfortune for a child to hear 
any * scare' stories. They torture the young mind, and are real afflictions. The 
stories in the volume before us have in them none of the revolting elements found 
in ' Blue Beard,' ' Jack the Giant Killer,* and the like. They are, on the contrary, 
delightful in every respect, and admirably adapted to the purpose suggested by the 
title.' ' — Chicago Jourjtal. 

MISCHIEF'S THANKSGIVING AND OTHER 

STORIES. By Susan Coolidge. With Illustrations by Addie 

Ledyard. Square i6mo. Price ^1.50. 

'* * Susan Coolidge ' has won the hearts of all the young folks by her three 
books, *The New- Year's Bargain,' 'What Katy Did,'^ and 'What Katy Did at 
School.* She has a fresh pleasure ready for them this winter in the shape of a 
volume entitled ' Mischief's Than ksgivingf and other Stories.' Over these pages I 
fancy many other bright young readers are destined to meet ; and, when ' Mischief's 
Thanksgiving' shall have found its way to its waiting public, 'Susan Coolidge' 
will be more than ever a household word among those most appreciative and un- 
forgetful of readers, the children." — Mrs. Moulton in the N. Y. Tribune. 

F. GRANT & CO. ; or, PARTNERSHIPS. A Story 
for the Boys who mean Business. By George L. Chaney. With 
Illustrations. i6mo. Price $1.50. 

** His special aim here is to illustrate the perils and temptations that beset boys 
(or men) in partnership enterprises. A larger purpose is to commend truth, purity, 
and reverence, and show the worth of manliness. We suspect a deeper intent 
still, which is benevolent, and so 'moral' in the author; namely, to please the 
boys. That he has succeeded in this is as certain as that the healthy and genial 
tone of the book will help to make goodness attractive, and meanness hateful to his 
readers." — Unitarian Review. 

" The book Is full of boy life from beginning to end. It is written by one who has 
never lost his hearty sympathy with It. It has the same naive charm in its kind 
that the first volume of ' Little Women' had. It Is written out of memory, when 
fancy has just touched it with the distant hues of sunset, and the story is all the 
more powerful because we find in it both the boy and the man." — Boston Tran- 
script. 

SPEAKING LIKENESSES. A Christmas Story. By 
Christina RossETTi. Illustrated by Arthur Hughes. Square i2mo. 
Price ^1.50. 

** Miss Rossetti's stories generally enlarge little eyes and silence little tongues, — 
for a few minutes ; then there begins a series of questions as numerous and search- 
ing as if the authoress had announced a new theological dogma to a mixed party 
of ministers. The influence of such stories seems to us very healthful : there Is 
as much of a moral In each one of them as In a Sunday-school book, but it is so 
thoroughly concealed as to be unsuspected during ihe readinn:, and comes to light 
only when the inevitable questions are asked." — Christian Utiion. 

COLLEGE STORIES. By Eleven Sophomores. Square 

i2mo. Price ^1.50. 

" We all know what Freshmen are good for, — for the * Sophs' to tease ! But we 
have only just discovered the true functions of * Sophs,' which certainly Is neither 
more nor less than to make little people happy. Certainly no sweeter volume of 
stories was ever written than these. Every one carries a trutli, a hope, a lesson, 
and a charm After one hasty reading. It is Impossible to forget either, for each is 
full of individuality, of artistic and perhaps unconscious purpose." — Mrs. C H. 
Da^l in Boston Transcript, 



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